Consumer Reports Review Batters Lincoln

Ford Motor Co.’s (NYSE: F) Lincoln luxury car brand needs as much help as it can get. Its sales still greatly lag those of BMW, Mercedes, Audi and Toyota Motor Corp.’s (NYSE: TM) Lexus. Consumer Reports did not aid Lincoln’s case by giving it a poor rating in its new 2016 car brand research study.

Overall, Lincoln ranked 17th among the 30 brands evaluated. Audi ranked first, Lexus third, BMW fifth and Mercedes 14th. The organization’s editors wrote:

Ford’s luxury brand offers models that are plusher and better equipped than their basic brethren. Most recent models possess competent ride and handling. The well-executed MKZ, which is based on the Ford Fusion, stands out with a luxurious, quiet interior, and ride and handling that rival European sports sedans. But we can’t say the same about the MKC compact crossover, which doesn’t make a compelling case for itself over the Ford Escape Titanium. Like Ford, reliability has been spotty, largely because of the MyLincoln Touch electronic control interface, which has been replaced by Sync 3 on some 2016 models.

Not the sort of endorsement that gets buyers to showrooms.
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Lincoln’s trouble, which goes back decades, tells in its sales. Through the first two months of 2016, they rose 19% to 15,216. Much of this was due to its new MKX model, the sales of which jumped 77.6% to 4,427. No question, this is progress, but Lincoln needs to sell thousands more vehicles to be a viable competitor to the industry’s leaders. Mercedes sold 51,773 vehicles the first two months of the year.

Lincoln needs to top the quality charts across several important car studies that buyers watch closely. At this point, it is not close.