Ford Motor Co. dug more than 100 years into its vault of old logos to tie its latest manufacturing innovation back to the car that made it famous.
A winged triangle that CEO Jim Farley used to unveil the Ford Universal EV Platform comes from a 1912 variant of the automaker’s script badge. Ford used the logo to market the Model T as “The Universal Car.”
In an ad unearthed by the Autopian from the Henry Ford Museum, the company promotes the Model T’s versatility and affordability.
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“All Fords are alike — except the bodies," the ad reads. “We have focused our effort upon the making of one good car — and the consequent big production has battered the selling cost down to a minimum."
The ad explains that customers can choose a roadster, five-passenger car or delivery car, all based on the same undercarriage.
Now, in 2025, Ford is trying a similar approach, with a low-cost electric vehicle platform that can underpin as many as eight different models, starting with a pickup in 2027.
The company updated that 1912 logo to say “The Universal Vehicle” and used it for the announcement that Farley had dubbed a new “Model T moment” for Ford.
“The Model T became the first true universal car,” Farley said Aug. 11. “It was affordable, it was adaptable. It came in different body styles. You could put railcar wheels on it, you could use it as a sawmill. It changed society. And if you had a wrench and some common sense, you could even fix it. Now it’s time to change the game again.”
Farley clearly hopes the new manufacturing approach has more longevity than the winged-triangle logo, which Ford says was designed to represent “speed, lightness, grace and stability.” According to a timeline of past logos on the Ford Middle East website, “Henry Ford disliked the design and it was swiftly discontinued.”
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