Ford begins again to try and rebuild the increasingly tired Lincoln brand and the latest attempt give us the first ever Lincoln MKC. After a decade of basic badge engineering the company has decided to put some effort forth to truly differentiate the new models from their blue oval counterparts. This new MKC is based on the Ford Escape but shares very little outside its inner shell and is not at all recognizable as a relative of that car. To give an example of how bad things had been in the past then look no further than the 2007 Ford Edge and Lincoln MKX. This time the styling is rather elegant and modern and when you back that up with a dash of McConaughey and Jim Carrey – you just might be on to something here.
This new MKC is the brand’s first attempt at the growing Luxury Compact SUV market and with a base price of just over $33k the car is a bit of a bargain against the competition. There are several key players like the Acura RDX and new cars like the Mercedes GLA looking to compete with Lincoln head-to-head and the brand has their work cut out for them. However, in recent months the boys from Dearborn have been stacking up a slew of viral commercials that have been parodied everywhere from Ellen to the guys at South Park. Many critics will say that these spoofs are degrading the brand’s luxury image . However, executives at the company believe that getting the word out there and keeping their name in the public lexicon helps increase sales. Well October sales are out and it turns out that any press is good press as the MKC jumped up nearly 25% over September to surpass over 2,000 units.
I listed the competing SUVs in the segment to show that it was generally a growth month for most of them in October. The MKC sales were enough to jump ahead of the BMW X1 and I have to believe a few of the sliding RDX sales may have been shifted towards Lincoln. The all new Mercedes GLA seems to have ramped up sales fast in its first two months and I would imagine the car may pass up the Lincoln in November. The marketing bump certainly helped the MKC but it can only last so long.
To break down the past several months we went to Google to track how many people have been researching the car. According to Google Trends the launch of the popular commercial campaign with McConaughey jumped the search traffic for the vehicle when they debuted during the first NFL games of the season on September 7th. The car kept its search relevance with help from Ellen some weeks later and most recently the folks at SNL and Jim Carrey helped keep the MKC fever alive a little longer.
I was able to drive the MKC with AWD and the new 2.3L turbo 4 cylinder for a few days and can say that it has the package to backup the buzz. The interior had fantastic leather surfaces and a gigantic Vista Roof that allows all passengers to catch some sun when opened. The seats in the new MKC were the most comfortable leather seats I have ever planted myself in. All other makes could take a lesson from Lincoln here – especially Audi for the “park-bench-flat” seats in the Q7. The new turbo 4-cylinder that the MKC shares with the 2015 Mustang pulls hard and is smooth and quiet in all but aggressive acceleration. With AWD the car could feel a bit heavy and cumbersome at times but was agile enough and braked extremely hard when needed (only GLA stops shorter from 70-0 mph from the vehicles listed above).
Overall the Lincoln brand has released a decent product and is continuing to move away from their rather bland past. The MKC marks the second launch for their new styling approach after the new MKZ and is an important step for the company. With some help from their marketing campaign and social media buzz they might just be able to create a modern luxury brand.
