New Ford Super Duty Carhartt package unites two heritage brands

DETROIT - When Ford Motor Co. and Carhartt Inc. collaborate to design a co-branded vehicle, a Super Duty with durable design, functionality and Detroit manhole-inspired wheels is what you get.

The heritage, family-influenced brands with century-plus roots in the Motor City unveiled the pickup on Thursday at Michigan Central during a celebration with hundreds of skilled trades and blue-collar workers. It's the next element of their multi-year partnership focused on honoring this "essential economy" that both brands rely on for big profits. The new $4,195 option comes as an available package on the 2027 Ford Super Duty XLT crew cab 4x4 whose orders launch at 4 p.m. EDT Friday in the United States and Canada.

"We realized really quickly that Carhartt and Ford had a great overlap, and it was around the customers for Super Duty," said Steve Gilmore, chief designer for Ford vehicle personalization. "These are the hardworking people that we are serving all through the nation. What we came up with was a practical and unique package that helps deliver our message."

Attendees of the event enthusiastically gathered around to see the truck. Country-pop singer Niko Moon performed from the vehicle's bed.

"It's beautiful," said Jim Stewart, 66, of Dearborn, a warehouse driver who operates an F-250 himself for work. "These two (Dearborn) brands together, it's kind of cool."

The crossover between Ford truck - especially Super Duty - drivers and Carhartt wearers is heavy, designers behind the collaboration said. The partnership offers a "halo effect" that complements the Dearborn automaker's "Built Ford Tough" cachet and highlights the trendy, privately-owned workwear brand that was founded in 1889 in Detroit and is headquartered in Dearborn. The trim it's on is at the heart of the Super Duty lineup that emphasizes small business owner-operators who need to balance work and recreation, said Austin Solimine, Super Duty retail brand manager.

"Our customers are often right now showing up to a job site with Carhartt on," he said. "If you create a Venn diagram, and you put our target customer for Super Duty and Carhartt in there, it's that perfect overlap in the middle. I think it's going to be a lot of our existing Super Duty customers. It's these two iconic companies with national recognition coming together and creating a really special package."

Carhartt's popularity has skyrocketed amid a greater "blue-collar chic" trend, becoming last year's top winter apparel brand, supplanting The North Face, according to market researcher CivicScience Inc. Ford's profit-hound Ford Pro commercial business that includes all Super Dutys it sells is looking to reap that cool - and higher margins from in-demand, pricier off-road trims.

"We're both family companies founded in Detroit, cut from the same cloth," Ford Pro President Alicia Boler Davis said at the "Unsung Hero" event. "We've been on the same mission for over a century. We both value hard work, and we outfit the people who build things "

Meanwhile, Carhartt CEO Linda Hubbard said the truck is a job well accomplished: "We're incredibly proud of how it looks, but the first thing both designers said when they started was it's about function, not about how we want it to look great. They did great."

The vehicle has a dark-painted grille. Carhartt's name and logo appear throughout, but in ways that seek to align with Carhartt's "thumb test" design mantra - where the logo on its clothing is about the size of the opposable digit, but even when covered still is recognizably Carhartt.

"We took the mindset of: If it doesn't serve a purpose," Gilmore said, "it doesn't belong on this truck."

Most noticeably, the logo appears below the A-pillar above Super Duty badging. That's right where the powertrain is - the heart of the vehicle - just like the Carhartt logo appears over the heart of its jackets' wearers.

"We intentionally place the logo over the heart," said Ben Ewy, Carhartt's vice president of global product design, "and it's meant to show our commitment to hardworking people and honor the people who wear our gear."

He added that the collaboration "extends our brand. It kind of went from like: Why are we doing this, to how can we not do this? Because Ford and our approach to design is so similar - just really respecting hardworking people, understanding their needs and their job sites. I don't think there's any detail on here that we would have done differently. It feels like a pure expression of the brand."

The logo is stitched into the interior seats' headrests. The Carhartt name also is displayed near the running board, the tailgate and in the spray-in bedliner. There is no 4x4 badging on the vehicle, because all vehicles with the Carhartt package will be four-wheel drive.

Ford designers visited Carhartt's flagship store on Cass Avenue in Detroit's Midtown to find inspiration for the project. The pattern of a new Carhartt tool bag inspired the interior's floor mats. Fabrics on Carhartt items resulted in Ford opting for a triple stitch. And although you won't find Carhartt's iconic duck canvas fabric on the seats, the tones, texture and durability inspired the fabrics that were chosen for the cabin with 50% more abrasion resistance than those in the standard trucks.

"We treated every element in the interior like it was a piece of wood," said Bhavna Mistry, a color and materials designer for the Ford customization design team. "The seat material is engineered to hide the wear and tear of a productive day."

When designer Cecile Giroux, Ford vehicle personalization designer, walked outside the Carhartt store, she saw a scene that was "emblematic of Detroit," she said: Steam coming up from a manhole. It inspired her to work up a reimagining of the manhole cover into a 20-inch wheel.

"It is a truly Detroit thing," she said. "Ford is Detroit. Carhartt is Detroit. So therefore, I'm going to try to do a wheel that is inspired by a manhole cover, but I'm going to make it a little bit more sculptural."

Carhartt also has collaborated with Ford on an apparel collection, the first pieces of which are dropping on Friday. A larger offering, however, is coming in the fall.

The brands have a long history together. With the help of the Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation, a receipt from a 1927 order by Ford of Carhartt overalls for factory workers at the Rouge Assembly Complex was found. Historical records there also identified that Henry Ford and Hamilton Carhartt, the founder of the apparel manufacturer, met at least once on a boat.

They even dabbled in each other's industries, with Carhartt having produced and sold vehicles at one point and Ford running a clothing store. Other partnerships touched on NASCAR and Bronco II. A look at the history between the two was featured in an exhibit for the event at Michigan Central.

"That was a supplier-customer relationship," Ted Ryan, Ford archivist and heritage brand manager, said about previous connections between Ford and Carhartt. "What was different with this one was the deep dive into the essential economy and sort of the DNA of the two brands coming to life."

A conversation between Carhartt's Hubbard and Ford CEO Jim Farley at last year's Ford Pro Accelerate symposium at Michigan Central on the essential economy resulted in the partnership announced at the Detroit Auto Show, the executives previously have said. Beyond the products, the partnership also has included financial support for technician training through Ford Auto Tech Scholars and the opening of Detroit ToolBank, a nonprofit that leases tools to community partners, churches, schools and other organizations.

Essential economy workers said they appreciated Ford for holding an event to honor workers in their field and encouraged young people to consider their careers with fewer job security risks from artificial intelligence and opportunities with many current workers looking at retirement.

"Don't be hesitant to jump in," said Christopher Scott, 38, of Dearborn Heights, a member of Operating Engineers Local 324. "Listen and remain, but it's imperative you raise questions."

Camron Gnass, 50, of Lansing, founder and creative director of Traction Brands, works with clients like union employers and nonprofits on how they go to market and recruit. Organizations struggling to find workers often can change how they communicate their mission to attract interest, he said, but companies like Ford and Carhartt promoting the space also helps.

"It's nice," Gnass said, "to see when the larger companies lean down into the workforce and the people that help build the environment for them to be successful."

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