Great news for people looking to buy an all-electric pickup truck: Ford recently slashed the price of its F-150 Lightning by nearly $10,000, The Verge reported.
The price drops from $59,974 to $49,995 for the cheapest version and from $98,074 to $91,995 for the most expensive were among the latest volleys in the ongoing electric vehicle wars, which has seen the price of many EVs drop (and also sometimes confusingly bounce back up again) as competition heats up between brands.
MotorTrend named the Ford F-150 Lightning as its Truck of the Year for 2023 — that's the overall category, not just the best electric truck — writing that it "successfully bridges the gulf between the power train of the future and the pickup of today in a way no other EV truck on the market has accomplished."
Now, for customers looking to get their hands on one, the F-150 Lightning represents a good deal. Ford said that it was able to cut the price because of improvements in scale and battery raw material costs, according to Reuters.
However, another likely reason is that people simply were not buying the F-150 Lightning at its previous price point. The base version of the truck debuted in April 2022 at $39,974, but four successive price hikes saw it climb up to $59,974 by the end of March 2023, as The Verge reported.
It reported later that many buyers began canceling their reservations and orders, opting not to buy the vehicle after the prices climbed out of their budget ranges. Reuters reported that EVs from legacy automakers are piling up at dealerships, with many models struggling to reach profitable sales volumes.
But whatever the reason for the price drop, it's good news for prospective buyers, as the base F-150 Lightning now costs about 17% less than it did a week ago.
Although the F-150 Lightning, as well as some other models, may be getting price cuts, electric vehicles made in the United States appear to be getting more expensive, with companies sometimes making plans to shift resources from smaller, more affordable models in favor of electric pickup trucks and SUVs.
Regardless of whether these trucks are only available to the wealthy, the more people who turn from fossil fuel-burning vehicles to electric ones, the better that is for the environment as a whole. Therefore, these price cuts could be seen as a net environment win.
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