Filed under: Ford

Ford Motor Company is a publicly traded company with a catch: the Ford family permanently holds 40% of the company’s voting shares. That means the Ford family has an awful lot of pull, and if someone carrying the family name wants a job, there’s a 100% chance they’re going to get one.

The latest Ford family member to take a place at the company built by his great grandfather is Henry Ford III. The 29-year-old son of Edsel Ford is fresh off a summer internship at Galpin Ford, where he told AutoWeek that he sold five Fords and a Volvo. He is also getting his MBA at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a.k.a. MIT, and he’s getting ready to join the Ford team back in Dearborn. Henry III has been working at the company with his name on the door for some time, having already participated in the all-important labor contract negotiations in 2006 and 2007. He also worked as a junior high school math and English teacher, so his background is rather diverse.

While it’s tough to argue that the Ford name hasn’t helped Henry III tremendously (he did, after all, reportedly meet with then-CEO Bill Ford and other Ford execs in 2006 to discuss which job he’d receive), the newest Henry does appear to have his head on straight. Does he have a family right to one day run the company? We hope any promotions will come with actual accomplishments, but it may ultimately be too hard to ignore someone named Henry Ford.

[Source: AutoWeek | Image: Mark Vaughn]

Meet 29-year-old Henry Ford III, the next scion in line for the crown originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 28 Aug 2009 18:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Sedan, Government/Legal, Ford, Specialty

Quick quiz: What vehicle transported Paris Hilton to prison? If you answered Ford’s Crown Victoria Police Interceptor, you took the easy route and you were correct. The older than thou Crown Vic accounts for about 85% of the 75,000 police vehicles sold each year – a market where styling, amenities and new safety features have little to do with the vehicle’s success.

The CV’s body-on-frame construction helps the ubiquitous cop cruiser stand up to the punishment doled out by the guys and gals in blue. Body-on-frame platforms are generally also easier to repair, and anyone who has been in a police parking lot can plainly see that these vehicles take a big-time beating in the name of public safety. The CV is also rear-wheel drive for better handling, it’s large enough to fit even the biggest of felons (and cops), and its column-mounted shifter enables the fuzz to have plenty of room for a laptop. But alas, the Crown Vic is also older than dirt. We’d joke that Henry Ford himself had a hand in the creation of the CV, but chances are that Henry II actually did, and he retired as the head of the Blue Oval when Pong was state-of-the-art video gaming technology.

According to The Detroit News, in June, Ford hosted police personnel from some of America’s biggest cities to discuss the future of the police cruiser. The Dearborn, MI-based automaker told the police departments that the Crown Vic would be gone by 2011. That’s bad news for departments like the LAPD, which has a shop set up specifically to deal with the CV. Some police departments told the Motown newspaper that rear-drive vehicles like the Charger can’t hold up to the abuse of police work. Others are looking into the Impala, though the front-drive Chevy hasn’t gained much traction with law enforcement. One ray of hope could come in the form of the Carbon Motors E7 purpose built police cruiser, but it isn’t quite ready for prime time yet, and it’s likely to be significantly more expensive than the equivalent Blue Oval cruiser.

Ford is in a bit of a predicament in that the Crown Vic has the police (and cab) market to itself and, as Ford President Mark Fields points out to The Detroit News, the CV gives Ford a presence in just about every municipality in America. One vehicle that Ford gave to police to drive during their stay in Dearborn was the new Taurus, which is almost as big and roomy as the CV, but with far more safety tech, improved fuel economy and the (costly) option of an Ecoboost V6 under the hood in the form of the SHO model. The Taurus may not be the ultimate answer (at least it won’t be outrun by a Toyota Camry or Nissan Altima), but Ford insists that it isn’t giving up its police share without a fight.

[Source: Detroit News]

REPORT: Ford preparing cops for life after Crown Vic, has police sample Taurus originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 28 Aug 2009 11:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Etc., Ford

When Jaime Case and Chris Hodges decided to get married, Jaime didn’t want the regular run-up filled with fights, dresses, cakes, consultants and huge expenses. So she dreamed up a Wedding Road Trip, the theme of which was “Two people, two months, two hundred friends, one bad economy, one ring, one dress, one car, one life together.” Essentially, it would be a trip around these United States – with plenty of rules – to see friends before getting married.

To help make the trip, Ford Motor Company donated a Fusion sedan to the couple’s cause. It also happened that Jaime and Chris wanted to take new last names instead of Jaime taking her husband-to-be’s surname, and so the couple spent months trying to come up with one. After “two months of long conversations, intense fights, and hours of thinking,” the last name they came up with: Ford. That’s right, they are now Chris and Jaime Ford.

There were five criteria they used to choose the new name, and eleven reasons why “Ford” was found to be perfect. We won’t spoil it, but the justifications are wide-ranging, span rivers, a president and first lady, capitalism, egalitarianism, family, a Mustang fastback and two pickup trucks. Learn more at the link below.

[Source: Wedding Road Trip via USA Today | Image: The Ford Story]

Newlywed couple changes last names to Ford to celebrate… well, Fords originally appeared on Autoblog on Thu, 27 Aug 2009 17:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: SUV, Truck, Plants/Manufacturing, Ford

Two of Ford’s vehicles are moving well enough that the automaker is adding production to its plants in Missouri and Michigan. Ford says its F-150 and Ford Escape are looking to earn their highest sales of the year in August, with the F-Series truck line looking good for its first year-on-year sales jump since October 2006 and the Escape knocking on the door of its own sales record. Of course, August sales number are expected to be wildly inflated by the success of the government’s Cash for Clunkers program, so Ford is also taking into account the sales rates of these two vehicles before August and only boosting production by a smidge in response.

Thus, 2,800 workers at Ford’s Dearborn Truck Plant will go back to full-time work at the end of September, which will raise production of F-150s by 10,000 units through the end of the year. A third shift added to the Kansas City plant in October will raise production of Ford Escapes and Mercury Mariners by 2,400 through year-end. If production details are your cup of tea, you can read all of Ford’s good news in the press release after the jump.

[Source: Ford | Image: Scott Olson/Getty]

Continue reading Ford boosts production (slightly) of F-150, Escape

Ford boosts production (slightly) of F-150, Escape originally appeared on Autoblog on Thu, 27 Aug 2009 17:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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