Mazda American Production History : 1987-2016

The Mazda MX-6 

Ford's relationship with Mazda goes back to the 1970's, at one stage holding a 33% stake in the Japanese company. That has led to many partnerships which seem to have been beneficial to both parties, which would be why it lasted so long. Part of that cooperation involved the North American market.

Mazda wasn't really big enough to take on a US assembly plant on its own, so it did what other smaller Japanese car manufacturers did and work with a local car maker. In the 1980's, Mazda built a factory on a Ford site to manufacture vehicles in the US at Flat Rock, Michigan. It became known as the AutoAlliance.

Passenger cars: The Mazda MX-6 2-door coupé rolled off the assembly line in 1987, followed shortly later by the near identical Ford Probe. Sources say the Probe started production in 1989, but if some were made in 1988, then the MX-6 figure for that year on the list below is too high. The 626 sedan came in 1990 to round off car production for the time being. The MX-6 ended its run in 1997 but the 626 continued.

Light trucks: The first of such vehicles for Mazda wasn't built at Flat Rock but Louisville, Kentucky. It was the Navajo midsized SUV which was a essentially rebadged Ford Explorer. The Ford Ranger compact pick-up became the donor for the B-Series model from the same Ford factory. The Navajo didn't seem to work out so it ended. Sometime later, Mazda added the Tribute compact SUV model, a collaboration with Ford which was assembled by Ford in Ohio.

The end: From the mid/later 2000's, Mazda production numbers started to drop. The MX-6 had created more production volume than the Probe (and later the Cougar) but when the Ford Mustang arrived, it was very much the dominant model ahead of the 626 (later the 6). Mazda decided to end the arrangement and made its last US sourced car in 2012 with Ford taking over the AutoAlliance factory.

Mexico: In 2014, Mazda commenced production at its new plant in Salamanca, Mexico. We can see from the chart below how the units produced is well up on recent US numbers, as it needed to be to justify the cost.

Summary: Mazda was committed to strong production in the US but when it decided to go it alone, Mexico was the preferred country. Making smaller cars south of the border made economic sense, even if one political leader was not amused with that trend.

PS. If anyone can spot improvements needed with the data, please let me know.

Year	Passenger cars			Light Trucks			Annual
Model	3	2	6 / MX-6	Tribute	B-Series	Navajo	Prod
1987	-	-	4,200	-	-	-	4,200
1988	-	-	163,300	-	-	-	163,300
1989	-	-	108,500	-	-	-	108,500
1990	-	-	74,500	-	-	-	74,500
1991	-	-	91,100	-	-	12,100	103,200
1992	-	-	88,800	-	-	4,800	93,600
1993	-	-	115,800	-	48,800	7,700	172,300
1994	-	-	133,100	-	64,400	5,100	202,600
1995	-	-	98,900	-	46,600	-	145,500
1996	-	-	95,700	-	53,000	-	148,700
1997	-	-	90,800	-	36,900	-	127,700
1998	-	-	94,200	-	46,800	-	141,000
1999	-	-	87,100	-	49,600	-	136,700
2000	-	-	67,300	36,600	29,500	-	133,400
2001	-	-	46,700	64,900	28,500	-	140,100
2002	-	-	47,600	65,800	22,100	-	135,500
2003	-	-	83,400	61,800	23,400	-	168,600
2004	-	-	91,300	46,700	8,500	-	146,500
2005	-	-	74,200	40,700	7,800	-	122,700
2006	-	-	71,500	15,000	6,700	-	93,200
2007	-	-	54,300	23,800	6,400	-	84,500
2008	-	-	75,100	15,900	4,300	-	95,300
2009	-	-	32,100	7,400	1,900	-	41,400
2010	-	-	45,200	9,300	2,400	-	56,900
2011	-	-	39,500	4,000	-	-	43,500
2012	-	-	37,600	-	-	-	37,600
2013	-	-	-	-	-	-	0
2014	100,700	1,700	-	-	-	-	102,400
2015	138,500	43,900	-	-	-	-	182,400
2016	114,500	34,700	-	-	-	-	149,200
Total	353,700	80,300	1,844,300	391,900	487,600	29,700	3,038,300
Average	117,900	40,150	73,772	35,627	27,089	7,425	108,511
	Mexico		USA