 The plan affected Mercury by calling for the marque's first completely new platform and body design since World War II in order to differentiate it from Fords, beginning with the 1957 model year.Historically, Mercury was usually considered a "lower-medium-priced" car, most often compared to Pontiac and Dodge.Under Breech's plan Mercury would move upmarket and compete more directly with Buick, Oldsmobile, Chrysler and DeSoto and the Edsel would take over Mercury's previous role as the lower-medium-priced car and compete more directly with Pontiac and Dodge.