Ford has declared the end of the best-selling car in the United Kingdom, the Fiesta.
By the end of June of next year, the manufacturer’s factory in Cologne, Germany, will no longer make Fiestas.
According to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, the Ford Fiesta was the most popular vehicle in the United Kingdom, with 4,804,098 sold.
It outsold the second-best-selling vehicle in the UK, the Ford Escort, by more than one million units.
The vehicle routinely ranked among the top five best-selling vehicles and was number one from 2009 until 2020.
Since 1976, more than 22 million of this model have been manufactured and sold in more than 50 countries.
Since its debut in 1976, the automobile has won numerous honors, including the British Design Council’s award for the economy in 1978 and Germany’s coveted Golden Steering Wheel award in 2002.
The removal of the popular vehicle coincides with Ford’s efforts to make room in its lineup for additional electrified vehicles.
Ford’s plant in Valencia, Spain, will cease production of the S-MAX and Galaxy models by April of next year.
Ford will only produce electric vehicles by 2030, and all of its vehicles will be electrified by 2035.
Ford stated that three new electric vehicle types and four commercial vehicles will be introduced in Europe by 2024.
The manufacturer intends to sell more than 600,000 electric vehicles in the region by the year 2026.
The Fiesta has a special cultural significance in the United Kingdom, as it was the first car for many and the second car for many families during the 1990s and early 2000s when automobile ownership increased.
Its release corresponded with a sharp increase in the number of British women driving and commuting as more women entered the workforce.
