Honda made only “evolutionary” design changes to the CR-V, said Michelle Krebs, an analyst with auto researcher Edmunds.com. The Escape and the CR-V lead one of the fastest-growing automotive segments. Ford also is emulating the CR-V’s fuel economy by dropping the Escape’s V6 engine and boosting mileage by as much as 5 miles per gallon. While Ford declined to give mileage data, a 5 mpg improvement would raise the least-efficient Escape to 25 mpg in combined city and highway driving, matching the lowest-rated 2012 CR-V.
Though Escape is Ford’s second-best seller, with U.S. sales up 31 percent this year, the new styling was necessary to continue to attract buyers, said Erich Merkle, the company’s sales analyst. In the past decade, Ford stuck with a truck-oriented design on the Explorer SUV to keep sales robust on the high-profit model. “We’re not waiting for the market to destroy the Escape,” Merkle said. The CR-V outsold the Escape for the previous five years. Ford trails General Motors Co. in sport- utility vehicle sales so far this year in the U.S.
The new CR-V goes on sale in December, while Ford said it will begin selling the Escape in the first half of next year. “CR-V has one of the highest instances of female buyers, about 55 percent this year,” Edwards said. For Escape, the current average is 51 percent, he said. To increase cargo space, Ford made the Escape 3 inches longer and 1 inch wider, said Eric Loeffler, the model’s chief engineer. That made the Escape heavier, though Ford declined to say how much weight was added.
To overcome the added weight and improve fuel economy, Ford is offering three 4-cylinder engine options, including two versions of its “EcoBoost” powertrains that improve mileage by up to 20 percent with direct-fuel injection and turbochargers. The Escape also offers automated parallel parking. Neither Ford nor Honda has revealed prices for the new SUVs. Starting prices for the current CR-V range from $21,895 to $26,845, according to Edmunds. Honda doesn’t offer a gasoline-electric CR-V. “The current Escape has very high fleet sales and rich incentives,” Krebs said.
The fourth-generation CR-V isn’t a drastic departure from the previous model, but given the outgoing CR-V managed to set sales records even in its later years, it’s not too surprising Honda isn’t too keen to completely reinvent the wheel. Older all-wheel-drive models were reluctant to send power to rear wheels on hard launches, but that’s no longer the case.
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