According to Autonews, citing two dealers with knowledge of the matter, the plan is to have Mercury and its dealerships removed by the end of December. The Grand Marquis will end production on September 30, the Mountaineer on October 1, the Milan on October 2 and the Mariner on October 3.
The discontinuing of Mercury does not come as a surprise to anyone. Mercury as a brand was created by Henry Ford's son, Edsel, in 1939. Although Mercury vehicles were Ford vehicles with a unique luxury touch, the company hasn't been, even since the beginning, very clear on how to describe Mercury. While some viewed it as a cheaper luxury brand from Lincoln, other considered it a performance division of Ford.
The Mercury fame reached its highest grounds in the 1970s, with the so called "Total Performance" era (a global promotional advertising campaign conducted by Ford, emphasizing performance) bringing no less than 580,000 customers to the brand.
In the end, however, the bad numbers had their say. With a market share of only 0.8 percent of Ford's 16 percent slice of the pie, Mercury is the only bad performer in the carmaker's lineup. Currently there are exactly zero stand-alone Mercury dealerships in North America...
Mercury is, if you like, the first ever auto brand to die of old age.
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