'Hillbillies' and 'rednecks' line up for the electric Ford F-150 Lightning

In Europe, we don't understand why large pickups are so popular in the United States. In 2020, the Kia Niro was the best-selling car in the Netherlands. And in the same year, the Ford F-150 topped the US sales ranking for the umpteenth time. The almost 5.5 meter long truck - which is available with V6 or V8 - was 'over the counter' exactly 787,422 times. The Chevrolet Silverado (586,675 copies) and the Ram 1500 (563,676) follow at an appropriate distance.

About 120,000 reservations for the Ford F-150 Lightning

Ford has about 120,000 registrations for the F-150 Lightning at the time of writing. If you compare that with the sales figures of the conventional F-150, that is not much, but we can still speak of an impressive number. As mentioned, the American pickup public is conservative and already started to prance when the F-150 came on the market as a hybrid. So the popularity of the electric variant is a surprise.

Ford production targets more than doubled

Also for Ford, which has hurriedly doubled its production targets. According to Reuters news agency, Ford initially planned to build no more than 40,000 F-150 Lightnings per year. That number will now increase to more than 80,000 per year up to and including 2024. For the following years, the production target will even rise to 160,000 units on an annual basis. According to Ford, the demand comes not so much from individuals, but from companies.

The electric pick-up market is getting busy

The electric pickup segment promises to be busy. The Ford F-150 Lightning will soon be joined by the GMC Hummer EV (the heaviest car on the market), the Rivian R1T, the Tesla Cybertruck (which has been delayed again), the Nikola Badger, the Alpha Wolf, the Lordstown Endurance, the Bollinger B2, the electric Chevrolet Silverado, and more.