This will be achieved by shortening the summer shutdown from two weeks to one and raising production by 40,000 units. In addition, the company will recruit over 3,000 hourly paid workers to meet customer demand for the best selling models.

‘To meet surging customer demand for our top-selling cars, utilities and trucks, we are continuing to run our North American facilities at full manned capacity, and we will add 200,000 units of annual straight-time capacity this year,’ said Jim Tetreault, vice president of North America Manufacturing.

‘Approximately 75% of our plants are running at a three-crew, three-shift or four-crew pattern in order to ensure we’re getting more of our products into dealerships.’

Increased production will affect Explorer, Fusion and F-Series models.