Ford Motor Company has announced a plan to nearly double production of the F-150 Lightning truck at the Rouge Electric Vehicle Center. Demand for this first all-electric version of the best-selling F-Series is incredibly high, with many reservations already taken. The new production goal for the F-150 Lightning will be 150,000 trucks per year, and beginning on January 6th, the first group of reservation holders will be able to place their orders. Ford is also planning to implement a wave-by-wave reservation process to help mitigate the process. Reservation holders will be asked to look out for an email invitation to know when their wave is up.
“With nearly 200,000 reservations, our teams are working hard and creatively to break production constraints to get more F-150 Lightning trucks into the hands of our customers,” said Kumar Galhotra, president of The Americas & International Markets Group, Ford Motor Company. “The reality is clear: People are ready for an all-electric F-150 and Ford is pulling out all the stops to scale our operations and increase production capacity.”
In order to successfully deliver this production increase, a small task force of employees from manufacturing, purchasing, strategy, product development and capacity planning are all working to find ways to alter production on the F-150 Lightning. Ford is working with key suppliers of the vehicle’s components to increase capacity as well.
The final pre-build phase on the truck is concluding this week, after which production of the F-150 Lightning for retail customers and the F-150 Lightning Pro for commercial customers will begin in full force. These trucks will collectively accumulate around 1 million miles as they are used for testing in real-world customer conditions. In the spring of this year, the 2022 F-150 Lightning is expected to begin production.
On top of scaling Lightning production, Ford will also be tripling production on the Mustang Mach-E with the goal of reaching upwards of 200,000 units per year by 2023. The all-electric E-Transit van will also go on sale early this year, providing even more valuable feedback on the popularity of Ford’s new electric lineup.