Can’t make a profit on cars

Ford

We can’t make a profit on cars, so we’re going to stop making them. Ford has announced that they will be discontinuing the Fiesta, Focus sedan, Fusion, and Taurus, they will continue with the Mustang and maybe the Lincoln lines.

Here is the very dumb reason that Ford CEO Jim Hackett gave to Automotive News, “We’re going to feed the healthy part of our business and deal decisively with the parts that destroy value.” Ford reports making sedans is not profitable for them,well maybe Ford just does not know how to efficiently and economically to make them. Car makers from Japan, Korea and Germany seem to be able to make sedans at a profit, maybe Ford needs to take a good look at them and reevaluate how they operate.

Per Techcrunch.comFord estimates that SUVs could make up as much as half the entire U.S. industry retail market by 2020, and that’s why it’s shifting $7 billion in investment capital from its cars business over to the SUV segment. By 2020, Ford also aims to have high-performance SUVs in market, including five with hybrid powertrains and one fully battery electric model.”

Ford must think that by only selling what they want to make that they can funnel the American car buying public into SUVs and away from cars. The problem is that no matter what they say SUVs for most people are a waste of both space and money. You have to remember that in the 1950s and up till the first oil crisis in the 1970s the American car companies pushed ‘The big is better and safer’ concept on the car buying public.

It was not until our government in Washington forced them to make fuel efficient vehicles that the size of cars went down dramatically in size without sacrificing safety. But the auto makers found that they could not build these smaller cars and make a profit and yet the Japanese car makers of that time period did! So that tells me that we have to learn how to work more efficiently at building cars and not just say that we can’t make them at a profit!

The bean counters at Ford have taken over and the engineers have been pushed off to the side. While this will result in a short term rise in profitability, I know in the long term that the buying public will end up moving away from Ford and toward car makers that produce vehicles that they want and need. The American car buyer does not need the car makers dictating what the driving public wants and the excuse that they will still be able to give us non-gas guzzlers is just window dressing to divert our attention away from the fact they are severely bending the truth.

In the end our government will have to come up with automotive mileage standards that will convince auto makers that SUVs and Pickups do not make good family vehicles for everyone.

That is my opinion- Jumpin Jersey Mike

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