February 12th, 2010

Meet Antonella in her Fiesta with the pink trim

James Cameron, what have you done to us? It looks like Avatar has come to Detroit. We would like to introduce you to Antonella, she is 28, really hot and does not exist. Oh, and she’s the new inspiration for the Ford Fiesta.

Ford has taken to creating imaginary personalities to design their cars around. That’s right, these personalities are not real people. According to the New York Times, “Antonella cares more about the design and function of her telephone than that of her car.” In other words, Antonella is the usual female stereotype that car companies imagine: a ditzy idiot who cares more about the checking Facebook on her iPhone rather than buying a fun, cool, fast car. We’d also like to ask Ford, why exactly did you decide to create a muse to design a car for who does not even like cars?

“Invented characters get everyone on the same page,” Said Moray Callum, executive director of Ford Americas design. “Personalizing gives context to the information we have. Sometimes the target demographics are difficult to relate to by, say, a 35-year-old male designer.” Ok, but who is creating these avatars then? Callum claims the avatars are created from demographic research about the cars target customer. But is this a chicken and egg scenario? Perhaps if you market a car to a smart, savvy woman, who at the very least enjoys driving then perhaps that is the customer you will attract.

Something tells us Ford is not going to change its strategy soon since the Fiesta is Ford’s best-selling car in Europe, and in the first half of 2009 it was the No. 2 seller over all in that market.

We hate to be disappointed in Ford especially since we were so impressed by Christina “Chrissy” Rodriguez, the Vehicle Dynamics Development Engineer for the 2010 Ford Taurus. Rodriguez has been working at Ford for 12 years (and she’s only in her 30s!).

CNN described her as “equal parts engineer, race driver and vehicle psychologist.” Born in Cuba, Rodriguez grew up in Puerto Rico where her father was a chemical engineer. But she says it was her mother who encouraged her toward a mechanical pursuit.

Clearly she’s a superstar at Ford given that they trusted her with their highly anticipated car. Perhaps her road hasn’t always been an easy one but certainly she has earned the role she has now. Rodriguez seems to love her job and has said about her current role “I know what a car should feel like, and I don’t get questioned anymore.”

C’mon Ford, get it together, more Christinas and less Antonellas!