I don't really think that anecdote applies cleanly to this circumstance. Had Boeing stuck by their guns and given the customer a new plane despite them wanting a faster horse, what's to say airlines wouldn't choose to buy new airplanes from Airbus instead? If the only option to an airline is to switch planes and retrain pilots, then the relative cost of switching away from Boeing goes down.
Ford was selling a car in a class of it's own, at a price range and volume that was unmatched in the rest of the automotive industry at the time. Boeing is not.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbus_A320neo_family