Ford’s Compact SUV Was Almost Called The Excape

The Ford Escape had a good run, from its introduction in 2001 to its discontinuance after the 2026 model year. However, as famous Bostonian Cliff Clavin would say, it’s a little-known fact that Ford’s compact SUV was very nearly called the “Excape,” according to Automotive News. Here’s the story of how the name came to be, with its proper dictionary spelling in the end.

It all started with the Ford Explorer. No, not that crazy pickup truck with wings, but the SUV version of the Ranger pickup, which replaced the smaller Bronco II to compete with the Jeep Cherokee and Chevy S-10 Blazer. It caught the wave of surging interest in SUVs and rode it to great success. Ford decided to apply the same formula to a larger F-150-based SUV, and tasked marketing manager Leo V. Williams III with choosing its name. 

Williams wanted to capitalize on the Explorer’s success with a similar name, starting with “EX.” As a former Marine, the name for this larger SUV came to him easily. As he explained to From the Road, Ford’s press site:

We wanted the public to perceive this new vehicle as a “go anywhere, do anything” kind of vehicle. In the Marines, when we say we are “expeditionary,” it means we go anywhere, we do anything for an extended period of time. The image we wanted for the vehicle and the image the Marine Corps has had for its entire existence — they just meshed perfectly. It was pretty easy for me to suggest to my team that we name this new vehicle the Expedition.

This set the stage for all of Ford’s SUVs to begin with the letters “EX.” The even larger Excursion followed, though its naming process wasn’t nearly as intuitive as the Expedition’s. “We probably went through 10 to 12 possible names before we landed on one that fit its rugged, ‘ready to do the work’ character,” said Williams.

The Explorer left its Ranger roots behind for the third generation, introduced in 2002, leaving a gap at the compact end of Ford’s SUV range. Seeing this coming, Ford developed a new compact SUV to slot in below the growing Explorer for 2001. Williams wanted to continue Ford’s established naming trend, but this time he ran into some trouble.

I actually wanted to take a risk and name it “E-X-C-A-P-E.” This was around the time hip-hop was becoming popular and automotive names were getting more creative. But my bosses got bogged down in the fact that it wasn’t a real word they could find in a dictionary. They liked the concept of being able to “escape” the everyday world, so we kept the name but lost the unique spelling.

I always considered the Cadillac Escalade more connected to hip-hop than a compact Ford, but that’s just me. He’s not wrong about the naming trends of the time, though. Some might remember the Plymouth Neon Expresso of the late 1990s, which changed the word “espresso” the same way that Williams wanted to change “escape.” The letter X was quite popular around the turn of the millennium. “The X-Files” was at its peak of popularity, and the first X-Men movie had just come out.

Things have certainly changed in the past 25 years. The Ford Excursion only lasted until 2005. While the Explorer and Expedition live on, Ford abandoned the “EX” SUV naming scheme, reviving the Bronco and adding the Mustang Mach-E. The Escape remains for now, but would it have lasted 25 years if it had been called the “Excape?” The trendy name would have dated quickly, which could have led to poor perceptions once the X fad of the early 2000s was over (except for Elon Musk, who is still obsessed with the letter X). Ford might have given it a different name later on, or discontinued it early if the funky name hurt sales badly enough. So while I like to imagine an alternate reality with Ford Excapes everywhere, Ford probably made the right decision to spell it correctly in the first place.