The 1957–1959 Ford-Chevrolet Sales Race: Busting Some Myths About When Ford Finally Beat Chevrolet — Twice

Ford was the No. 1 automotive brand in America until the mid-1930s, when it fell inexorably behind Chevrolet. Although Henry Ford II was determined to reclaim the top slot after World War 2, it took Ford until the late 1950s to do it. They managed it twice, first in 1957, and again in 1959, although neither year was an all-around victory.

Ford in Second Place

The mid-1950s were a very frustrating time for Ford Motor Company. After the end of Korean War restrictions on production and credit, Ford and Chevrolet had launched a full-fledged sales war, but Ford had kept coming up short. Even in the record-setting 1955 model year, when total domestic production hit more than 7.1 million cars, Ford still only managed second place.

In 1956, Ford managed to pick up 3 points of market share — no small feat in a cooling-off period for the industry — but Chevrolet still came out firmly on top, in market share, in production, and in sales.

(When automotive historians talk about how well a particular car or truck did commercially, there’s a tendency to treat “production” and “sales” as basically synonymous. Much of the time, that’s mostly true, but to fully understand what happened in the 1957–1959 period, it’s important to recognize that those things aren’t exactly the same. As we’ll see, in a close race, the distinction matters!)

The 1957 Fords

Ford had several competitive advantages going into the 1957 model year. 1957 Ford cars were all-new, whereas Chevrolet was fielding a second facelift of its 1955–1956 body shell. Ford also had bigger engines (up to 312 cid, whereas Chevrolet still topped out at 283 cid).

On top of that, the Ford line was now divided into four models in two distinct sizes: The cheaper Custom and Custom 300 were 201.7 inches long on a 116-inch wheelbase, a bit bigger than the 1956 Ford, while the more expensive Fairlane and Fairlane 500 were 207.7 inches on a 118-inch wheelbase.

Both 1957 Ford lines were bigger than the 1957 Chevrolet, which was 200 inches on a 115-inch wheelbase in all series. The big Fairlane was also 1.6 inches longer than the swoopy new Plymouth.

Offering two sizes was unusual in this class, but product planner Chase Morsey Jr. (whose book, The Man Who Saved the V-8, I worked on years ago) calculated that it would “give us a leg up on Chevrolet.” He was able to sell the idea to then Ford Division general manager Robert McNamara by figuring out how they could offer two lengths at a modest cost using shared tooling.

The longer-wheelbase Fairlane models weren’t any roomier (in fact, they actually had a bit less interior space than the Custom series), but they looked bigger, closer in size to a Buick Special or Oldsmobile 88, and they weren’t any more expensive than a Chevrolet Bel Air. At launch, a six-cylinder Fairlane four-door sedan listed for $2,248.66, $13.34 less than a Bel Air four-door sedan; the better-trimmed Fairlane 500 was only $46.32 more than the basic Fairlane, about $33 more than the Bel Air. (Chevrolet and Ford both raised prices during the model year.)

There were actually two distinct ’57 Ford designs: The Custom and Custom 300 were the original concept, done by Frank Hershey’s Ford design studio.

The bigger Fairlane and Fairlane 500, with their sculpted rear fenders (something that caused Ford production people a lot of headaches), were credited primarily to Joe Oros. Although Oros would subsequently become chief of the Ford studio, when these cars were designed, he was still a consultant working for George Walker (who became a Ford employee and VP in May 1955). He was assisted by Ford designer Gale Halderman, later a principal architect of the 1965 Mustang.

The Fairlane and Fairlane 500 drew some inspiration from a concept car called the Ford Mystere, designed by Bill Boyer in the Ford studio. This was actually developed concurrently with the original in-house proposal for the 1957 production cars, and Ford decided it was similar enough that its show-circuit introduction was delayed until October 1955. A crucial Mystere feature that didn’t make it to the 1957 production cars was quad headlights, which were still in a dicey area when it came to some state lighting laws.

Although it still has its fans, the styling of the 1957 Ford hasn’t aged particularly well. Personally, I’ve always found it hard to get past the gawky single headlight treatment, which I think makes these cars look like background characters on The Muppet Show. This face didn’t deter contemporary buyers at all, but, like a lot of 1950s recipes, it doesn’t necessarily suit the modern palate.

Conversely, while the 1957 Chevrolet is considered a ’50s icon today, buyers at the time didn’t seem to find it as fresh or attractive as the 1957 Fords. It didn’t help that the Chevrolet was 7.7 inches shorter, 3.1 inches narrower, and up to 3.6 inches taller than an equivalent Fairlane 500, and cost a bit more, model for model. The 1957 Chevrolet sold pretty well in its day, and in some ways it was the better car, but it wasn’t the instant classic that modern nostalgia has since made it.

The 1957 Ford-Chevrolet Sales Race

Dealer introduction of the 1957 Ford line was on October 3, 1956, 15 days ahead of the 1957 Chevrolet. For the month of October, Chevrolet was still ahead in new car sales, by 5,483 cars. However, beginning in November 1956, Ford sales really took off.

Early buyer interest in most of the 1957 cars was strong, but the 1957 Fords were a bona fide hit. Ford dealers sold 255,457 of them just in November and December 1956, 13,727 more than Chevrolet sold in the same period.

In that period, the U.S. auto industry tracked its commercial performance in two principal ways: production and registrations. Automotive trade publications like Automotive News, Ward’s, and Automotive Industries released weekly and monthly factory production totals, which the industry followed closely. Meanwhile, R.L. Polk & Co. purchased new car and truck registration lists from state motor vehicle departments and tallied them into monthly and annual reports, usually releasing some preliminary data before final counts were ready.

Why track new car registrations as well as production? While it could be assumed that all the cars automakers were building would eventually be sold, it might take months for all the cars built in a given week to find their way to retail customers, and not all were necessarily sold in the U.S. (The production totals included exports, either built-up cars or CKD kits for assembly overseas.) The health of the auto industry depended on finding a balance between production and registrations. Excess production forced dealers to discount heavily or sell excess inventory to unfranchised dealers, but inadequate production could starve dealers of product when demand was high.

High early demand for the 1957 Ford wasn’t enough to put Ford on top in either registrations or production for the 1956 calendar year. Ford production for calendar 1956 (including Thunderbird) totaled 1,373,542, against 1,621,005 Chevrolets (including Corvette). Ford calendar year new car registrations for 1956 totaled 1,375,343 to Chevrolet’s 1,565,399.

However, Ford went into the 1957 calendar year with considerable momentum, bolstered by the late introduction of the flashy Fairlane 500 Skyliner retractable hardtop — not a huge seller, but a definite conversation piece that probably helped to drive traffic to dealers. By the end of January 1957, Ford dealers were complaining that they couldn’t get enough new cars to satisfy demand. Ford Division general sales manager Charlie Beacham reported in February that Ford had sold more than half a million cars in the first three months of the model year, a new record for the company.

Ford new passenger car registrations continued to outpace Chevrolet through most of the model year — in March alone, Ford outsold Chevrolet by more than 10,000 cars. This was particularly remarkable because as of January 1957, Chevrolet had 547 more U.S. dealerships than Ford Division did.

The only time during the model year that Chevrolet managed to nose ahead in retail sales was September 1957, probably through more aggressive discounting at the end of the model run. Ford dealers weren’t as quick to cut prices to clear out their inventory, telling Automotive News that they were afraid they’d run out of the popular ’57s before the 1958 Fords became available that October.

At the conclusion of the 1957 model year, Ford was the clear winner. They had built over 120,000 more 1957 cars than Chevrolet, 1,676,448 (including Thunderbird) versus 1,515,177 (including Corvette). The longer-wheelbase Fairlane/Fairlane 500 had turned out to be a good bet, accounting for over 43 percent of model year production. The following table shows monthly new car registrations during the 1957 model year, from October 1956 to October 1957. By my count, Ford sales topped Chevrolet by 58,948 units for this period.

Month	Chevrolet	Ford
Oct-56	114,633	109,150
Nov-56	112,619	117,100
Dec-56	129,111	138,357
Jan-57	101,116	110,454
Feb-57	104,228	108,672
Mar-57	128,596	139,070
Apr-57	126,372	134,506
May-57	134,322	139,127
Jun-57	127,762	131,841
Jul-57	135,452	137,529
Aug-57	117,744	123,632
Sep-57	123,181	121,154
Oct-57	114,223	117,715
Total for 1957 Model Year	1,569,359	1,628,307

The Race for the 1957 Production Crown

Although the model run figures were cause enough for celebration, to claim total victory for 1957, Ford needed to also come out on top in calendar year production. This would prove to be much more difficult: The economy had soured throughout the summer and fall of 1957, and by autumn, new car sales were definitely slumping. The trade publications tried desperately to put a brave face on it, but by late December, Automotive News reported that dealers they talked to were using “such terms as ‘lousy,’ ‘depressed’ and ‘disturbing’ to describe the situation in their own shops or in their marketing areas.”

The ominous signs in the marketplace didn’t lessen Ford Division’s determination to win the 1957 production race, so as soon as the model year changeover was complete, they began very aggressively ramping up production of the ’58s, even before the dealer introduction on November 7. Ford assembly plants scheduled mandatory overtime and additional Saturday shifts. Chevrolet responded in kind, and by Thanksgiving, both automakers were setting new records for weekly output.

Stepping up production in this way was very costly — especially for Ford, whose facelifted 1958 cars didn’t go over nearly as well as the division had hoped.

Personally, I think the 1958 Ford has aged better than the ’57, except maybe for the fake hood scoop and heavy-looking taillights, but a lot of people didn’t like it. Joe Oros, who had led the design of the 1958 models after becoming a Ford employee in 1955, admitted later:

My problem was what the ’58 should look like. Product planning wanted to change the ’57 Ford car radically as a facelift from front to back, and they wanted a complete front end change, and a dramatic back end change, but, again, to be as dramatically successful as the ‘57. This was quite a full basket to request, and this proved to be an error … we didn’t quite make it, and, to me, that was a terrible agony. It just was not as spontaneous a total theme as the ’57.

Many contemporary buyers considered the ’58 a step down from the ’57, which didn’t help sales.

The result of all this was that the frantic production pace was simply not sustainable for Ford. Dealers were already struggling to sell less-popular cars in a weakening market. November retail sales of new Ford cars were down more than 16,000 units from October, a very bad sign for a new model. Worse, the all-new Thunderbird — which the 1958 Fords were supposed to look like, and which would probably have helped to pep up buyer interest — wasn’t slated to arrive until the New Year. What had started as a production race now looked increasingly like a game of chicken.

Ford was the first to flinch. At the end of November, they were still ahead in total year-to-date production, but by the first week of December, Ford Division general manager James O. Wright had seen enough grim sales reports to realize it was time to hit the brakes. Ford hastily cut overtime and eliminated most Saturday shifts. Their previous production lead shrank rapidly as Chevrolet charged ahead, continuing six-day-a-week production at all 10 of its assembly plants. By mid-December, Ford had concluded that they could no longer afford to keep up. Over Christmas week, U.S. Ford plants furloughed 21,000 workers.

By the time the New Year hangovers wore off, the 1957 production race was over, and it was clear that Ford had lost, albeit only narrowly. The initial estimates from Automotive News, released in early January 1958, put the final 1957 calendar year production tallies at 1,522,406 Ford (including Thunderbird) and 1,522,550 Chevrolet (including Corvette), a difference of 144 cars. A bit later in the year, the Automobile Manufacturers Association (AMA) published calendar year totals of 1,522,408 Ford, 1,522,549 Chevrolet, a difference of 141 cars. Ford Motor Company records list 1,522,408 as their final calendar year total, but Chevrolet records now list their final 1957 calendar year passenger car production as 1,522,536 units. Based on the factory figures, Chevrolet’s final margin of production victory was a mere 128 cars.

However, all the 1957 new car registrations hadn’t yet been counted, and the preliminary R.L. Polk data suggested that the year-end Chevrolet surge wouldn’t be enough to overcome Ford’s strong initial lead in new car sales. Automotive News finally called it on February 17, 1958:

Twenty-two years of frustration ended last week for Ford Motor Co. with final new-car registration figures for 1957 showing Ford ahead of Chevrolet for the first time since 1935. Although outsold by Chevrolet in November and December, Ford had built enough of a lead earlier in the year to coast to the wire in front. The final count was 1,493,617 for Ford and 1,456,288 for Chevrolet.

(So that there’s no confusion, the above figures were for total new car registrations, not production, and they were for the 1957 calendar year, not the model year. They include 15,686 1957 Thunderbirds and 6,811 1957 and 1958 Corvettes.)

1958: A Bad Year for Both Ford and Detroit

Ford Motor Company posted a handsome $283 million profit for 1957, up 19.5 percent from 1956, but the 1958 downturn was a grim time for dealers. Although 1957 had started strong, the National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA) reported that the fall slump had left new car dealers with a lower average profit margin in 1957 than in the year before. The Ford-Chevrolet production race can’t have helped, leaving many dealers with a glut of new cars to move.

The early months of 1958 were even worse. NADA reported that in the first quarter of the year, dealers were losing an average of $46 on each new car they sold. Some didn’t survive the squeeze; Ford lost 143 dealers between the start of 1957 and the start of 1959, while Chevrolet lost 341 dealers.

There was no chance of Ford regaining its sales lead in 1958. One of the few bright spots for Ford Division was the new four-seat Thunderbird, which proved very successful. However, it wasn’t a big volume product, and total Ford passenger car output for the 1958 model year was down to 987,945 cars, compared to 1,217,047 for Chevrolet. Ford Motor Company ended up posting an operating loss of $25.3 million for the first three quarters of 1958.

That fall, Ford Division general sales manager Walter J. Cooper claimed that “our dealers have received the 1959 [models] enthusiastically,” and promised a renewed challenge for Chevrolet. However, Chevrolet still had more total new car registrations in 1958: 1,234,414, compared to 1,028,893 for Ford. Unsurprisingly, Chevrolet was also ahead in 1958 calendar year production — 1,255,943 to 1,038,560 according to the AMA, 1,255,935 to 1,038,560 according to factory records.

A Ford Turnaround in 1959

For 1959, the standard Ford line was all-new, now consolidated on the longer 118-inch wheelbase, which was no longer restricted to the pricier Fairlane and Fairlane 500 series.

As Cooper had promised, the 1959 cars, which bowed on October 17, 1958, were much better-received by the public than the 1958 models had been. Ford briefly moved back into the lead in October new car registrations.

Ford did especially well with the new Galaxie, which went into production on November 17 and appeared in showrooms in December.

For about $52 more than a comparable Fairlane 500, the Galaxie offered a plusher interior and (on all but the convertible) the added glamour of a Thunderbird-style formal roof. By February, Jim Wright said the Galaxie models had joined the popular station wagons as Ford’s hottest sellers.

This didn’t enable Ford to top the bat-winged 1959 Chevrolet in model year sales, but they came close, and the arch-rivals were again neck-and-neck in sales throughout the spring selling season. When the model year ended, Chevrolet had built 1,481,071 cars (including Corvette), while Ford was close behind with 1,462,140 (including Thunderbird).

Dearborn might conceivably have been able to build on that success, but Ford miscalculated again: The 1960 full-size Ford, conceived before the introduction of the 1959 model, went in a completely different styling direction. We’ve previously talked about that flop and how it came about here on Curbside Classic, but suffice to say the 1960 Ford was another serious commercial misstep and didn’t sell well. Early in the 1960 model year, Ford was also obliged to limit production to conserve their supplies of steel during a major steelworkers strike. It was a rocky start to an underwhelming year for full-size Fords.

However, this story has one final twist. Since the recession of 1957, dealers had been watching the growing market share of smaller imported cars and pleading for Detroit to offer something more compact and economical. Studebaker had responded with the 1959 Lark, which did quite well, and in early October 1959, Chevrolet and Ford introduced their entries, the Chevrolet Corvair and Ford Falcon.

Although the Falcon and Corvair were both 1960 models, their production and sales actually began in the 1959 calendar year, and Ford and Chevrolet sold a fair number of them in those early months. This brought the final tallies for 1959 calendar year registrations to 1,471,249 Ford, 1,419,131 Chevrolet. Thanks to the Falcon, Ford also ended up on top in 1959 calendar year production — according to the AMA, 1,528,592 Ford cars and station wagons to Chevrolet’s 1,428,980 — even though Ford fell short of Chevrolet in model year production for both 1959 and 1960. (Chevrolet records give their 1959 calendar year production as 1,428,962; Ford records list the same 1,528,592 total reported by the AMA.)

It wasn’t the all-around knockout victory Henry Ford II probably wanted, but it was a victory nonetheless: In a three-year period, Ford had come out ahead of Chevrolet twice in calendar year new car registrations, once in model year output, and once in calendar year production.

Tall Tales in Modern Sources

The Ford-Chevrolet sales race in this period was a big deal for a lot of fans of both marques, which has led to a lot of confusion about the outcome. Nearly all that confusion comes down to people not grasping the difference between model year production, calendar year production, and calendar year registrations, with the rest attributable to the minor differences between the totals presented in different sources.

Small discrepancies in production or registration totals were quite normal in that era. Tallying all those figures in the era of paper records took time and a lot of work, and, as with political elections, the industry was keen to know the outcome as quickly as possible. Once all the records had been reconciled, it was not unusual for the final totals to be adjusted up or down, although even in a very close race, those adjustments were rarely enough to make any difference in the outcome.

This has not stopped automotive historians from indulging in some very questionable myth-making, implying uncertainty and controversy that simply did not exist. The late Richard M. Langworth claimed in multiple editions of the Consumer Guide Encyclopedia of American Cars that “Some statisticians also had Ford ahead in [1957] calendar-year volume for the first time since 1935, though the final score showed Chevy ahead,” while Special Interest Autos editor Tim Howley opined in 1994, “Experts may go on well into the next century arguing about who won” in 1957 and 1959.

None of this alleged controversy is evident in the contemporary sources, even in the very close 1957 Ford-Chevrolet calendar year production race. The totals for 1957 were close enough that a final reconciliation COULD conceivably have changed the outcome, which would have been a big deal and a big story, but it didn’t happen. Production and registration numbers were very closely scrutinized back then — they was front-page headline news for the industry, not obscure fodder for Langworth’s mysterious “some statisticians” — and the slight differences in the published production totals didn’t add up to any “Dewey Beats Truman” reversals. I went through three and a half years of trade publications and found no indication that anyone was arguing the results or demanding a recount.

The factual upshot — which people in the industry at the time knew by the following spring — was as follows:

• 1957: Ford was unequivocally first in model year production, new car sales during the model year, and total calendar year registrations, but Chevrolet came out slightly ahead in total calendar year production, thanks to aggressive early production of its 1958 cars.
• 1958: Chevrolet was the clear winner in model year production, calendar year production, and new car registrations.
• 1959: Ford was behind Chevrolet in model year production, but came out on top in calendar year production and calendar year registrations, thanks to strong early sales of the 1960 Falcon, which arrived in October 1959.

I’ll agree with one thing Tim Howley said in 1994: “The figures may vary slightly depending on your source, but history generally regards Ford as the winner two years out of three.”

 

Related Reading

Curbside Classic: 1957 Ford Custom 300 – A Migration To Parts Unknown (by Jason Shafer)

1957 Ford Fairlane 500 Sunliner – Ford’s First Five Hundred (by Adam Dixon)

Curbside Classic: 1958 Ford Fairlane 500 – Movin’ On Up (by Jeff Nelson)

Curbside Comparison: 1957 Ford Custom & 1958 Ford Custom 300 – Getting the Most For Your Money in the Late ’50s (by Stephen Pellegrino)

1959 Ford Fairlane 500 Galaxie – “Thunderbird In Looks, Thunderbird In Luxury” (by me)

The 1960 Ford Was A Big Styling (And Sales) Flop — Here’s How It Might Have Looked (by Paul N)