Ford delivers its first all-electric vehicle made in Kansas City and demand is soaring

Kevin Hardy
·2 min read
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The first Kansas City-made electric vehicles just rolled off the line at Ford’s massive factory in the Northland.

Detroit-based Ford Motor Co. announced Tuesday that its Kansas City plant began shipping the 2022 E-Transit van, the electric version of the popular Ford Transit cargo van.

The E-Transit is the company’s second electric vehicle, following the brand’s Mustang Mach-E. Ford spent $100 million upgrading its Kansas City Assembly Plant in Claycomo and hired 150 new employees to build the electric van.

“Our employees are very excited about being a part of history,” said Carlos Howell, manager of Ford’s Kansas City plant.

A Ford E-Transit van is shown inside the automaker’s Kansas City Assembly Plant. Ford just delivered the first models of its all-electric cargo van.
A Ford E-Transit van is shown inside the automaker’s Kansas City Assembly Plant. Ford just delivered the first models of its all-electric cargo van.

Ford’s is the largest manufacturing center in the Kansas City area. The Claycomo plant employs 7,100 workers and produces more vehicles than any other Ford factory on the continent. In addition to the E-Transit, the local plant produces the gas-powered Transit van and the best-selling F-150 pickup.

Employees are also building batteries for the electric van in Kansas City — making the plant Ford’s only factory assembling both batteries and electric vehicles in house.

Officials in Detroit said demand is strong for the E-Transit van with 300 customers already ordering more than 10,000 vans. Though the vans are available for personal use, they are most often used for government or business fleets. Current customers include Walmart and the City of Orlando, Ford said.

The vans have a range of 126 miles per charge with a suggested retail price of $43,295.

“E-Transit is a testament to the fact that an electric commercial fleet is no longer a vision of tomorrow, but a productivity-boosting modern reality,” Kumar Galhotra, president of The Americas & International Markets Group for Ford, said in a news release.

Like its rivals, Ford has spent billions to transition to electric vehicle production. The company said 40% of its vehicles will be electrified by 2030.

Within the next two years, Ford officials say they expect to have the global capacity to build 600,000 electric vehicles per year.

Three models of Ford’s new E-Transit van, an all-electric vehicle built in Kansas City, are shown here.
Three models of Ford’s new E-Transit van, an all-electric vehicle built in Kansas City, are shown here.

But Ford continues to struggle with supply chains that have yet to bounce back to prepandemic rigor.

At the Kansas City plant, the F-150 line was idled this week and the Transit line was cut to one shift as the automaker struggles to secure the microchips needed to meet demand.

“The global semiconductor shortage continues to affect Ford’s North American plants — along with automakers and other industries around the world,” said Ford spokeswoman Kelli Felker. “Behind the scenes, we have teams working on how to maximize production, with a continued commitment to building every high-demand vehicle for our customers with the quality they expect.”