I saw a Mach-E at a local car
I saw a Mach-E at a local car show about a month ago and I was actually surprised to see it. It was up on a podium and locked, but so were most of the featured, new cars at the show. I was also surprised to see the Toyota RAV4 Prime (also locked) available to see up close. My reaction was the opposite of yours, for me it showed that Ford was really committed to building a crossover that can actually rival the upcoming Tesla Model Y. Looking around, Chevy had their pretty much unchanged Bolt, Chrysler had zero EVs and no sign of them coming in the future. Honda had their CRV-Hybrid, but that's a pale offering. I don't remember noticing any EVs from the European marques, but so far most of their offerings are too pricey to consider seriously anyway. I agree that those numbers are tiny compared to the Tesla Model 3 and later Model Y and Cybertruck reservations, but Ford did say that their initial reservations were being limited to the number of vehicles that they had capacity (read batteries) to build initially. If I were Ford, I would have offered the more expensive Mach-E GT first, because it's the one that should provide top acceleration. Once we see some Mach-E GTs at the drag strip beating classic high performance cars as Tesla did then car enthusiasts will start getting more excited about them. Show goers were certainly drooling over the Shelby GT500, and the new Corvette, but the Mach-E still drew a crowd. I don't think that Ford needs (or expects) to dominate the BEV market right away, but the fact that they are visibly committed to building BEVs and showing what the real production car will look like can inspire buyers more than promises and commercials.