"H.C. McK______" > wrote in message
t...
> You think that it is being critical of Bill Ford to say that he is more
> Franklin Delano Roosevelt than Teddy Roosevelt? Your credibility went the
> moment you wrote that sentence.
> Grover C. McCoury III > wrote in message
> ...
>> By Daniel Gross for Slate
>> 4/14/05
>>
>> Last week, Ford Motor Co. showed all the signs of a once-great company in
>> distress: a sharply reduced earnings forecast, a credit-rating cut, and a
>> sliding stock. Ford has been here before, most recently in early 2003.
>> The
>> latest run of bad news may represent either the next stage in a long
> decline
>> or the point at which a miraculous comeback begins. Regardless, it has
> ended
>> the hopes that CEO William Clay Ford Jr., the youthful great-grandson of
>> Henry Ford, would quickly restore the nation's second-largest automaker
>> to
>> its former glory.
>>
>> Bill Ford, the first recognizable personality at the top of an American
> car
>> company since former Chrysler head Lee Iacocca, is a hybrid executive, a
>> postmodern synthesis. Although he came to the CEO's post in the fall of
> 2001
>> with no great accomplishments, his lineage and his élan gave him instant
>> credibility. A humanist among gearheads-Ford is a self-confessed
>> guitar-strumming tree-hugger, though he also professes a deep affection
> for
>> muscle cars-he promised to build an intellectual and managerial bridge
>> between Ford Motor Co.'s glorious 20th century and its uncertain 21st.
>> "There is an air of nonchalant enthusiasm about Bill Jr., a man clearly
>> comfortable in his own skin," Douglas Brinkley wrote in the definitive
>> Wheels for the World. But while the miserable run of numbers is obscuring
>> some of the genuine good Ford has done, it seems like the bridge is
>> buckling.
>>
>> Henry Ford pronounced history bunk. Bill Ford wallowed in it. Born in
> 1957,
>> he grew up in exclusive Grosse Pointe, prepped at Hotchkiss, and enrolled
> at
>> Princeton. From an early age, Bill had "an intense infatuation with
> American
>> history, particularly Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Edison, the Plains Indians,
>> and his own ancestor, Henry Ford," as Douglas Brinkley put it. Bill
>> worked
>> one summer at Greenfield Village, his great-grandfather's nostalgic
>> reproduction of a pre-automobile America. At Princeton, he wrote a thesis
> on
>> Henry Ford's labor policies.
>>
>> When Bill went to work at Ford after graduating in 1979, the company was
>> both a supercharged global corporation and a fourth-generation family
>> business. Henry Ford's descendants controlled the company through a class
> of
>> special voting stock, and the presumption was that the males among them
>> would find their way to the top. Bill rotated through different
> departments
>> and joined the board of directors in 1988. But when it came to executive
>> ability, he was more like the young Franklin Delano than like Theodore
>> Roosevelt. According to Brinkley, his boss, Don Peterson, thought him
>> "the
>> most likely fourth-generation Ford to rise to the top" but not because he
>> had "any remarkable skill." "What he had was a fine manner," Peterson
>> explained. "He never became fully knowledgeable of any particular aspect
> of
>> the company. But he was naturally bright and that can compensate for a
> lot."
>>
>> In January 1999, Bill Ford was named chairman of the board at the age of
> 41.
>> And while Jacques Nasser ran the company as CEO, Ford engaged in
> big-think.
>> Other American car manufacturers planted new facilities in low-cost
> foreign
>> countries; Bill Ford advocated investing in domestic manufacturing. His
>> signature project involved investing $2 billion to turn his company's
>> vast
>> River Rouge complex outside Detroit into a technological and
>> environmental
>> showcase. As his competitors feverishly opposed any efforts to boost fuel
>> efficiency, Ford proclaimed in 2000 that he could increase the fuel
>> efficiency of his company's SUVs by 25 percent in five years. The next
> year
>> he unveiled the design for the Escape Hybrid SUV, billed as the car that
>> would occupy a happy middle ground between the new Japanese hybrid
> putt-putt
>> and the masculine Hummer.
>>
>> At the same time, however, Ford Motor Co. continued to stamp out hundreds
> of
>> thousands of gas-loving Expeditions, Explorers, and Lincoln Navigators.
>> Sales of these land yachts boosted Ford's top line, but the bottom line
>> suffered. Distracted by investments in technology and services, and
>> intent
>> on maintaining too many brands, the company was caught short by the
>> 2000-2001 downturn; it lost $5.5 billion in 2001, and Nasser resigned
>> that
>> October.
>>
>> Assuming the role of CEO, Bill Ford made a series of tough decisions. In
>> 2002, he pushed through a major restructuring, eliminating 35,000 jobs,
> five
>> plants, and the Lincoln Continental. Spurred by ultra-low interest rates
> and
>> 0 percent financing, Ford Motor Co. recovered quickly. Results improved
>> markedly in both 2003 and 2004. Future strategy rested on relentlessly
>> seeking efficiencies and pumping up the volume of key products, pickup
>> trucks and SUVs. Pretax profits would rise to $7 billion by 2006, Bill
> Ford
>> promised. These profits would enable the company to make the investments
>> needed to transform it.
>>
>> But then Ford the company's drive for profits ran right over Ford the
>> humanist's eco-friendly vision. Bill Ford's promise to boost fuel
> standards
>> for SUVs was abandoned in 2003 as too costly and impractical. Meanwhile,
> the
>> Escape Hybrid remained trapped on the drawing board until last fall, even
> as
>> the Toyota Prius became a status symbol. Environmentalists turned on
>> Ford,
>> somewhat unfairly. The River Rouge plant, which was opened to the public
> in
>> May 2004, is an environmental showcase. And this is a guy whose "distaste
>> for nonbiodegradable materials" is so powerful that the curtain and
>> carpeting in his office "are all made of hemp," as Brinkley noted. Still,
>> Ford's image continued to take a beating, especially after it was
>> revealed
>> he had been allocated 400,000 shares of Goldman Sachs in a 1999 IPO. Ford
>> was a major Goldman Sachs client, and Goldman president John Thornton sat
> on
>> Ford's board. Ford's own board absolved him of wrongdoing, but he sold
>> the
>> shares and gave the profits to charity nonetheless.
>>
>> Ford Motor Co. turned around enough to have a good year in 2004. But its
>> profits came mostly from its financing arm. And there were signs of
> trouble.
>> In the 2004 fourth quarter, vehicle sales fell far, and Ford's U.S. auto
>> operations lost $470 million. And in recent months Ford and General
>> Motors
>> have been getting the tar kicked out of them by Toyota, Honda, and other
>> companies that specialize in smaller, more fuel-efficient cars. Aside
>> from
>> the F-150 truck, Ford lacks big hits. As this March report shows, in the
>> first quarter of 2005, sales of the Excursion, Explorer, Expedition, and
>> Navigator-the big vehicles that sport far higher profit margins than the
>> Taurus-have all declined sharply.
>>
>> The environmentally friendly products that Bill Ford said would be
> integral
>> to the company's future also now seem peripheral at best. But it's one
> thing
>> to overpromise and underdeliver to the Sierra Club and quite another to
>> do
>> the same to Wall Street. In April, just one month after reaffirming its
>> profit projections, Ford reduced its estimate for 2005 by nearly 30
> percent
>> and rescinded the promise of $7 billion in pre-tax profits for 2006. The
>> market responded by driving Ford's stock down to $10. And last Friday,
>> Standard & Poor's lowered Ford's credit ratings-it has $173 billion in
> debt
>> outstanding-perilously close to the dreaded junk level.
>>
>> To be sure, this is a very difficult time, perhaps an impossible one, to
> be
>> the chief executive of an American auto business. The factors that are
>> making it difficult to turn a profit-expensive steel and oil, a weak
> dollar,
>> rising health-care costs, aggressive foreign companies-are likely to be
> with
>> us for awhile. And the government certainly isn't in any mood to help.
>> But
>> Bill Ford no longer appears to be what the Ford family and the company's
>> 324,000 employees needs. His job isn't in jeopardy, since his family
>> still
>> controls the company. Ford Motor Co. might be best served, however, by a
>> sharp break from the past. It needs someone to bust things up, to make
>> difficult choices about its many brands, about its relationship with
> labor,
>> about the basic nature of its business. In short, it needs an executive
> who
>> more closely resembles relentless Henry than sensitive Bill.
>>
>> Yet another $.02 worth from a proud owner of a 2001 Ford Ranger 4x4 and a
>> 1970 Mach 1 351C @ http://community.webshots.com/album/18644819fHAehGJAjt
>>
>>==
General Motors is also haveing major problems. If the price of gas goes
higher
anyone who makes gas gusslers is in for a hard time. I used to be a supplier
to
Ford and GM. Ford spends a lot more time and money fixing problems than GM
does,
and is willing to pay a LITTLE <VBG> more for a better product.
Geoffp


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