Ford’s Mercury brand is in dire straits. An ageing fleet, dying sales and lack of image is causing the Blue Oval’s middle brand to slowly wither away. However Ford seems defiant that the brand will survive, but fails to mention how it will manage to do so. Jim Farley, vice president of FoMoCo, said at the Chicago Auto Show recently, “its role is changing, but we’re not going to compromise Mercury.” However he also stated, “No doubt Lincoln and polishing up the Blue Oval is absolutely our priority.”

According to Bloomberg News, CEO Allan Mulally has been quoted saying that while Ford is committed to Mercury the company is studying exactly “what we want to do with all our brands.” It seems obvious that Lincoln is much more a priority to Ford right now, especially as its sales grew 9.1% last year in comparison to Mercury’s sales decline of 6.9%. Some industry experts describe Mercury as a ‘franchise on life support’ and believe that the brand could face the axe within four years, sighting the main reason being that Mercury cars have simply been rebadged Ford models for too long.

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