The spy
photos and
videos have come and gone. Internet speculation, desire and buzz has channeled its way up the ladders, some falling off as wishful thinking and some actually crawling into the mighty corporate offices in Dearborn.
But Ford has now held its final testing trial with consumers before the company moves from prototypes and begins producing the real deal: the 2010 Ford Mustang.
Every year, the blue oval sets up customer clinics to gauge consumer interest, and this year’s was in Tampa, Florida—a hotbed for Ford Mustang owners.
The company’s external clinics have traditionally been conducted annually by Ford’s 6-Sigma Center, a team of 40 Ford MoCo employees ranging from product development to personalization to marketing, all led by Mustang chief engineer Paul Randle.
But with the battle of the pony cars next year (Challenger and Camaro release), the company has to be ready for the other guy. So, this year, 6-Sigma Center was joined by owners of competitive makes as well, including owners of the Dodge Charger, Pontiac GTO and Mitsubishi Eclipse.
"We wanted to find out why people purchased the Mustang and what else they'd shopped for," says Ronnie Ahmad, project specialist, 6-Sigma Center in an interview with TheMustangNews. "We added competitive-make owners to the mix not only to find out why they hadn't chosen a Mustang, but also to see if Mustang owners would stand tall when talking about their vehicles versus the others during the panel discussions."
Although 6-Sigma Center is composed entirely of Ford employees, the panel posed as a neutral market research group to make certain they would receive the most honest opinions from owners.
Consumers received $120 for attending the 90-minute clinic. Before sitting down for a recorded panel discussion, the participants filled out a brief survey. Satisfaction levels were high from the majority of Mustang owners, as expected. Owners of competitive makes had many more complaints, which the 6-Sigma team noted.
Such complaints have helped to make product alterations in the past. For example, TheMustangNews notes that comments from Ford Edge owners in the past have resulted in solving a problem with a glare from the instrument panel.
Nothing has been released regarding official tweaks being made to the 2010 Ford Mustang, but, judging from the 6-Sigma Center’s satisfaction with the clinic, much was gained and the team is ready to report back to Dearborn to prepare for official development of next year’s hottest pony car.
[Source] TheMustangNews
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