What is in a D.S.O.

[frasern]

my 67 LCC has a 2 digit district sales office code like most. The shop manual states a domestic special order, foreign special order, limited production option, or pre-approved special order would have an additional number, but regular production will not.
I have gotten a Marti report, which identifies my car as a fleet order, however the manual makes no mention of fleet orders. Is my data plate incomplete?, or is a fleet order considered regular production? If you place an order at the dealership, is that a special order? or would it need to have some non standard procedure to be considered S. O.?
If anyone else has a fleet ordered car, is it identified as such anywhere?
As an unrelated question, the report says "one of 2275 with 462 C6". What did the other one have? Did a 68 prototype have a 460? Yes, it's a silly question but, I have a lot of free time lately. Thank you.

[Dan Szwarc]

Fleet order still have to come from a specific district.
Personally, I have never seen any official paperwork related to fleet orders. It’s pretty Meaningless today.

[action]

The DSO on the warranty plate/decal identifies the LM Sales District office the vehicle was ordered.

All dealers were grouped to a District Sales Office.
The vehicle order was placed through the District and the District moved the order to the Company.

RPO = Regular Production Options.
LPO = Limited Production Options

Then there is special order and Fleet Order

Dealers will place stock orders for vehicles with no specific buyer/owner for their inventory. Or place vehicle orders for a specific customer/buyer as well. However a vehicle ordered for a specific customer is not necessarily a special order. That type of order is turned in and handled like all orders.

I will skip to Fleet Orders. There are recognized Fleets like municipality. (The City of or County or State of.) Or can be commercial entities like a taxi or livery companies. They will buy cars in bulk. Generally all of the vehicles are the same. However there are exceptions. And most dealerships did not handle fleet orders, certain urban dealers did this. Especially bigger orders.
Then there are other orders placed that would be considered Fleet as well. In the 1980s the vehicle count had to be seven or more.

The Fleet order can have Regular Production Options or may have options that are not offered for other vehicles. Either from a selection of a list of Limited Production Options or a Special Order that is only for that order. A common example would taxi or police vehicles are Limited Productions Options. Special Order are usually one off vehicles which may or may not go to a shop to be completed.

Depending on the order type there can be references to the order on the warranty tag. Or a reference to the vehicle as being built by the company as an incomplete vehicle.

Likely your vehicle was a part of a group of Lincolns that were built for one order typically for one buyer.

The MARTI reference may mean one of that body style and/or trim level. All 67 Lincolns had a 462 with a C6. Kevin Marti got the data and cataloged it on a computer. To market the reports he developed the "one of" concept and that has worked well to sell data.

Action

[frasern]

Thank you Action, that helps. Presumably then, the only time an extra code shows up, is for something not otherwise on the build sheet. I.E. a fleet with a company's special paint. So when someone claims their car is a special order, it's probably just a factory order. Essentially, that is what my car is, just ordered with a fleet discount.
Yes I know it's a silly question, I'm still researching the possible Expo connection and trying to uncover the cars history.
As for the last question, that was a bit of an afterthought. What I meant was that 2276 convertibles were produced, so it seems odd that 2275 had, what I thought, was the only engine offered.
I only got the deluxe, report, not the top report that breaks it down to 1 of 1.

[action]

An extra code or reference goes to a "special order" sheet or yes as you posted a paint scheme or some other option that is not typically available. That reference is kept for a time at the DSO so if needed it can be looked up. For replacement part or warranty coverage or something of that nature.

For the Marti report features, that is all Kevin Marti and his marketing mind. He is in my back yard and we had a club meeting there once. Go the chance to pick his brain and the subject of Marti Reports came up. On that topic, he sells data. But that data is backed up by hard copy of vehicle invoice. It is the factory invoices which look very similar to a window sticker. Those were printed in triplicate or maybe even more copies. One for the window, one for the dealer, likely one for the DSO and the factory kept one. Those factory copies were going to be disposed of and Kevin was in the right place at the right time. Now the factory contacts him on occasion. Actually is it The Henry museum that reaches out.

Action

[Stuart M. Cohen]

The DSO on my car's body tag is 82, which means it was a home office reserve and never went to a dealer. If you look in the maintenance manual, it will give you all the DSOs.

So I'm guessing the DSO on your tag is also 82?

[action]

The DSO on my car's body tag is 82, which means it was a home office reserve and never went to a dealer.

That DSO is Ford Corporate and higher up corporate in Dearborn at World HQ. Typically the car was assigned and then ordered by someone that had the car for an entire model year. Usually that kind of car was well optioned as the person assigned more likely than not got to place the vehicle order. (optioned it out just like a regular order) When done, the employee had a choice to buy it (like anyone in the company) but more often than not the car was rolled through an auction. Interesting trivia, when owned and operated by the company, there was no warranty coverage. All repairs and maintenance were paid retail at a dealership. And the in service date was always the first of some month.
I worked for the company and had many company cars. But I worked out of Seattle District office, All of my cars had a DSO of 54. I never had a car more than 6 months or so. It was a mileage thing. Once the car had 12,000 miles it was time for another. There were exceptions. Back then, I traveled 1000 miles a week.

There were District offices that reported to Regional offices that reported to corporate HQ as far as the pecking order.

Action

[frasern]

First, apology to Dan for putting this in the wrong place. Should have been in Authenticity, or Misc. I was not paying enough attention.
My D.S.O. is A2. Canadian code for L/M franchise, Quebec, labrador, and a small bit of Ontario. Ottawa is right on the edge, don't know if it's included.
Because Canada has it's own set of D.S.O.'s, it is not considered a foreign order, ( F.S.O.). Car was sold by Cumming- Perrault L/M, Montreal

[Jondors]

My 62 LCC Data Plate is blank for the DSO. Any theory on Data Plates that have no DSO?
I bought the car in Denver in 1986.

[action]

Special order. However that is usually 00
Was not ordered through a District Sale Office

Or it was an error.

Action

[frasern]

my '62 also has no code. As I can gather, in '61, no space on tag for D.S.O., '62 used for special orders, "63, all cars had a district code.
The '62/'63 supplement states; Units built on domestic, foreign, or other special orders will have the complete order #, also to appear (1963) is the 2 digit code for the district which ordered the unit.