New Ford Everest: Toyota Prado in its sights

Ford is setting its target sights on the Toyota Prado and other premium large SUVs with the new-generation 2022 Ford Everest.

The big Toyota has been the dominant force in the segment for years while its ladder-frame Ford rival has been something of an also-ran.

Check out the tale of the tape at the bottom of this story to see how new Everest compares with Prado.

But a dramatic overhaul of Everest revealed last night has the Blue Oval brand hopeful the battle can be joined and some pressure taken off the Ranger ute as Ford’s only truly successful model in Australia.

Official industry figures tell the story of Ford’s single model sales strategy in Australia.

The Ranger narrowly missed out on being the country’s number-one seller in 2021 but also accounted for more than 50,000 of the 71,380 Fords registered last year in Australia.

The Everest, also drawn from the locally-developed T6 platform family, was the number-two seller with just 8359 registrations.

But Ford is taking encouragement from the consistent upward trajectory the first T6 Everest has been on since first launching in Australia in 2015.

In its first full year on sale in 2016 it managed just 3614 registrations to be just 15th in the large SUV segment. In 2021, with more than double those sales, it was fifth.

But as the Ford Everest has grown, the Toyota Prado has trucked along remorselessly at the top of the pile, often with the light-duty Toyota Kluger slotting in as the number-two seller.

Back when it launched, Ford pitched the Everest’s pricing above other ladder-frame SUVs such as the Isuzu MU-X and Toyota Fortuner and tried to sell it as a direct Prado rival.

Buyers failed to embrace the concept and Everest pricing has slipped behind Prado since then.

However, with the new-generation Everest a price rise is guaranteed.

But armed with a tougher look, a luxurious new Platinum flagship, a superior 3500kg braked towing capacity and a 3.0-litre V6 turbo-diesel engine – as well as an existing 2.0-litre four cylinder – Ford is looking for a significant uplift in interest in the new Everest despite the extra dollars.

“The Lion V6 was obviously a key engine to put into the Everest to see that we could compete with the more premium SUVs that are out there in the market,” said T6 program chief engineer Ian Foston.

“We have made the vehicle look like it’s capable to match the capability it already had and then we have gone that one step further in making it more refined and more premium.

“We have grown Everest since 2015 and … with this next-generation Everest we are looking to take that further forward in terms of our growth.

“It’s really interesting, if you look at the growth of T6 Ranger since [it first launched in] 2011 and you look at the growth of Everest since 2015 … they have followed the same trajectory in terms of sales growth.

“So they are products that you need to get into people’s hands so they can drive it and then anecdotally tell other people what they think of it, to get that traction in the market and the authenticity and credibility of what the product is.

“[Everest] sales last year we are very happy with in terms of where it is heading. I think we are taking great strides in gaining share.”

Foston pushed back against the argument the Everest didn’t get as much respect as it deserved because of its close links with Ranger, the same way the Isuzu MU-X is derived from the D-MAX and the Mitsubishi Pajero Sport from the Triton.

Prado, by contrast, is a stand-alone model.

“For me we made that differentiation very clear in 2015, it’s not a ute-based product. It comes from the same platform but it’s a very different beast in terms of its capability and performance,” he said.

“I think for this product it’s taken that same mantra. T6 now supports two SUVs – Bronco and Everest – and it also supports two utes – Ranger and Volkswagen Amarok – so it is a platform that is actually capable of supporting all those very different customer needs from that one underpinning.”

New Ford Everest v Toyota Prado

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