The Challenge of Changing Markets - the story of the 1960 Falcon and Comet

In 1954, the Company began to designate the planners to be responsible for designing new cars that would compete in the small car market in which the public was beginning to show interest.

Teams of market researchers, driving various makes of small cars, asked the people they interviewed to try out cars and give their candid reactions.

A family carefully studies a chart showing various features which might be incorporated in a small car and tells the visiting market researcher which ones they would like to have in  a car.

ABOVE: Small cars built by other manufacturers were completely disassembled and each part was analyzed to determine its weight, the material from which it was made and its design.    BELOW: Early in the design stage, a clay model of the Falcon was displayed with its competitors in the courtyard of the Styling Building. Here the Company's Product Planning Committee could study the features of the car that would distinguish it from all other cars on the road.   NEXT.....