Ford profits from Toyota's woes

Ford Motor Company

After Toyota dropped the ball in the global auto industry, American car manufacturers Ford and General Motors were left to pick up the pieces and it would seem that, despite GM's very own mini-recall crisis, the two are beginning to see the benefits.

Ford in particular have seen an uptick in profits since Toyota's downfall, announcing that the company's February sales were up by more than 43 percent, beating out GM's monthly sales for the first time in more than a decade.

It appears that buyers that may have otherwise chosen a Toyota over a Ford may have had their heads turned by recent events, leading to a sales jump. In total, Ford sold 142,285 vehicles during the month of February. Ford said that they sold a total of 334 more cars than General Motors during the same time period.

Customers abandoning Toyota

GM recently announced it was recalling 1.3 million small cars across North America due to power steering problems, but the firm still posted a more modest rise of 11.5 percent, as it benefited from customers abandoning Toyota over the Japanese firm's recall problems.

"We got what we thought was our fair share of Toyota sales," said Mike DiGiovanni, GM executive director.

Toyota reported a fall in sales of 8.7 percent for the first full month since it announced major recalls in January, not surprising considering the world's biggest car company has now recalled more than 8 million vehicles over concerns about accelerator and brake systems.

"We expect our progress to continue"

However the sales slump was not as big as the company had feared. "I'm surprised that we sold as many vehicles as we did," said Bob Carter, a Toyota group vice president. But this has not been enough to dampen spirits over at Ford, who aren't putting all of the recent success down to Toyota's failings: "The strength of our new products and Ford's leadership in quality, fuel efficiency, safety, smart design and value are resonating with customers," said Ken Czubay, Ford vice president, US marketing sales and service.

"The good news is we have even more new products and fuel-efficient power trains coming this year, and we expect our progress to continue."

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Daniel Jones

Daniel is a Politics and Philosophy graduate from Cardiff University where he also worked as a section editor on the award winning student newspaper. After university he joined an IT support company where he was a B2B online writer. He loves anything to do with sport and joined GDS in July 2009.

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