Only thing I'm jealous of is the interior styling/LSD/gauges. But exterior looks too much like a Mazda. I'll take the outgoing exterior styling all day over the new one.
US is more of a SUV/Crossover country, not a small hot hatch country. Europe has more of a need of small cars so thats why the sales are alot better over seas. Hence why Europe tends to get the good hot hatches.
This is true. I was having this exact discussion with the sales manager where I have ordered my Orange Spice 2018( 2017 with a backup camara) .
The one car we could cite that has sold decently here that is small but has a big interior was the Honda Fit. Honda got it right with that car as they managed to make it fun to drive but also provide adult sized rear seat room and cargo room.
This is one of the mistakes that Ford made with the Fiesta was its interior rear seat room and cargo size are tiny.
Now fact is small cars are Honda's forte so they tend to have always been known for that market and they have catered to it because of that only recently upsizeing a lot of the cars and building SUV's for Americans.
Fact is no matter how any of you may want to hear this Ford U.S. has never had a solid rep for selling good small cars. Ya you can look at the briefly imported and sold here Fiesta MKI . Hell I owned two. Lol
As well as previous generations of Focus, for the most part people just never looked at Ford for small cars stateside.
That is Ford's fault going all the way back to the 1970's. While the Japanese car companies were building there reps on great small cars, the Americans were turning out trash. Still trying to sell bogged down anemicly powered ( due to mandated emissions slapped on engines not designed for it) regular to large sized cars.
The Datsun/Nissans, Toyota's, Honda's, Mazda's and Suburu's took over. Besides a few bright moments in the late 90's it was not until the early to mid oughts that companies like Ford started to get their shit together and building good and competitive vehicles.
It interestingly enough was also around the time the Japaense started buolding bigger trucks and SUV's specifically with Americans in mind. Gas got cheap and Americans back slid into bigger cars.
Chrysler has gone to town with this.
So to sum it up you have Ford USA not being known as being a great small car builder. Not bothering advertising the fact they can be and then screwing up on interior sizing and you have the situation as it sits now.
If Mullaly had stayed it might have been different, but everything the man stood for went out the door with him the minute he left.