Well, to start with, AFA boycotts have really never worked. This time they chose a weak target that actually was intentionally cutting sales in places (re: Taurus), and dependent upon truck sales, which weren't going to do well with rising gas prices. They could have chosen Toyota, who spends more than Ford on the ads in question, but they would have looked foolish boycotting a company with skyrocketing sales because of their deserved image as reliable and fuel-efficient.
However, think about it this way: There were about 659,000 who signed AFA's pledge. Assume that they were twice as likely to buy Ford as the average American, to make the effect look as bad as possible. That's 210,000 potential lost sales. However, that also is counting lost fleet sales, which are far less likely to be hit by the boycott. We'll count them anyway.
Of course, the average vehicle lasts about 14 years now, so that's 15,000 lost sales per year (not everyone boycotting would actually be buying a vehicle anyway).
That's really a worst case scenario, and not offset at all by any gains made in other demographic groups.
That's really a drop in the bucket.
And that ignores that retail sales for Ford have actually increased in many of the months the boycott has gone on. Ford is dumping unprofitable fleet sales fast, and that is where a huge portion of their loss in sales comes from.
Do you really think that if they thought it was making any significant impact on sales they would keep going (and most of all of what they have been accused of has stopped)?
You have convinced me. I am still not buying a Ford. I am starting to like GM products better anyway.