Howdy!!

They only got $34 out of the jacket. Don't think they can go to Wal-Mart and buy another jacket with only $34. $34 will only buy about 13 gallon of gasoline, might be enough to take them to work for 3 or 4 days.

There's also another $500 back if you finance through Ford Motor Credit for at least 91 days before pay off.

Ford management: As a stock holder, customer and retiree I have the following to say. Ford wishes to reduce my Retiree benefits to cut costs. One reason being lack of sales. I called the Ford dealer on Wednesday and ask what time they open on Thursday morning, 9 AM I was told. 9:10 AM Thursday I walk in the dealership ready to purchase a new car. Not a sales person on the floor, receptionist tells me all sales people are in a meeting it will be another 10 to 15 minutes. If the door is open for business at 9 am they should at least have sales people on the floor to sell a car. If there is going to a 1/2 hour meeting that day, either open at 9:30 am or start the meeting at 8:30 am and be ready for the customer at 9 am. Maybe this is one reason Honda, Toyota, etc. have become a threat to Ford, they might be on the job to sell when they open. I for one am tired of hearing Ford cry the blues over poor sales and yet put up with dealers that don't seem to care if they sell a car or not. Not only selling but servicing as well. I took my 2005 car in with 6 warranty concerns, one was a recall. Three days later I get the call the car is ready to pick up. Two items, one being the recall out of six have been fixed. Sitting at the dealership I check the 4 remaining items not repaired and they do not function as they are suppose to. Dealer tells me they could not find any problems with them, yet I am sitting there showing them what's wrong. One of the items they did finally agree needed replacing. They told me they would order the part and call me. That was 6 weeks ago still no call. Mr. Ford do you have to wonder what the way forward is????? Start out by shipping the dealers cars that don't need repairs the first thing the customer gets them. Second get a system in place where when the dealer is required to make a repair they do it! Maybe first you better train them how to sell the product.

It's also sad to get upset about something you can't do any thing about. :P You may not be old enough to even no what denial is :D

The week I hired into Wixom in 1965 I was told the plant would be closed by 1970, heard the same rumor several times through the next 40 years. Now Bill Ford said it will close. By June don't be surprised if Ford decides to utilize the plant for some new venture. I'm sure now that Bill said the plant will close the city of Wixom and the state will take the closing a little more serious and offer some super deals to Ford to utilize the plant for some use.

Plant manager shutting a line down! Very few plant managers know what's happening out on the floor. And many don't want to know. It's all about getting the numbers off the end of the line and out the door. I had several supervisors say make me look good. In other words don't let the plant manager find out about this, hide it. We had a few good salaried personal that really tried to do right. They fought for there workers and contacted upper management to get problems solved. What happened to them. Some were moved to cleanup supervisors or into other zones. This was in the mid 60's to mid 90's, maybe things are not the same today. But like I said in a earlier post, hiring folks fresh out of college into management positions has to stop. Experience will turn the company around, book smart fresh out of college will not.

Until Bill Ford understands he needs to promote from the factory floor so the people around him know the IN's and OUT'S of what really goes on down on the factory floor. Things will only go down hill. Hiring people that only know what they have read in books and been told is no substitute for experience. This needs to be applied from the floor zone supervisor to Bill himself. How many days do you think it would take Bill Ford to learn one of those jobs on the line??

It's a sad day for many Ford employees directly affected by today's announcements. Those of us retired also wonder in the future how this will enter into our lives. The thing that bothers me the worst about what I heard is they keep talking about bring the remaining plants up to capacity. In my 30+ years at the Wixom plant it seems the more orders we had, the faster the line run with close to the same number of workers. I assume in this case capacity means getting the needed units with as few a workers as possible. With less plants this means each remaining plant has to turn out more units than in past years. Any time we ran at or near capacity the more junk that went out the door to the customer. Hoping the dealer would finish building the unit. We all know that's a joke. If Ford would listen to the people on the factory floor they would not have the problems they claim too have now. Until Ford learns quality sells cars we don't have much to look forward to. We went through nearly the same thing back in the late 70's and it was said Ford will never go back to building cars the same way again. Guess what, as sales increased the junk started out the door to the customer again. I have no reason to think in years to come it won't happen again.

Mr. Ford please listen to the owners and owners to be, they will tell you what you need to build. I for one would like to see a small Focus size car or small SUV with a diesel engine that gets near 50 MPG such as the Volkswagen Golf or Jetta. I for one will buy it and I'm sure thousands of others will. Built them right the first time and stop the recalls. Get a handle on your dealers and make them fix it right the first time. No one likes to take a car back 3 or 4 times to get the same items fixed that were on the list the first time. So build it right the first time and don't ship the car to the dealer half build. I put in over 30 years in your plants seeing these half repaired units shipped to the dealer. Maybe the time has come for you to hit the factory floor. See for yourself what goes on as your sure not getting the truth told to you now. An the first clue is it's not the hourly folks on the floor saying ship it! Maybe you need a few of us oldtimers to take you around your plants and point this stuff out to you. Maybe show you how it's more important to clean the floor up when Mr. Ford is coming to a plant for a tour than it is to build a unit right. I'm 7 years retired, so let's hear from you younger workers of today. Is it still more important to cleanup, paint and hide the dumpsters when Mr. Ford comes for a visit than it is to use the people to build good units????

I like the Focus wagon

Would one really think that if the vote numbers were rigged first time they won't be on a recount??? In years to come you younger folks will hear of the steps taken by government both local and federal, industry, including unions to correct and stabilize the unstable economy of this time period. You will in years to come also learn of the reasons behind the huge rise in fuel prices in the last couple years. Just go back and read your history books at the things that were done 50 to 100 years ago and what the public was lead to believe at the time and what the truth really was. Then government and industry wonder why we think they trying to fool us. Eventually this distrust will cause many problems in this country.

2- Focus 1- Crown Vic 1- Taurus It's not so much the recalls as just having to leave it at the dealer to be fixed. Right now my 2005 Focus is in for a recall plus 4 other items that need fixing, been there 2 days so far.

All I ask for is Ford to build the next new car I purchase to be free of recalls. Get it right the first time. The last 4 have had to many recalls.

Last summer I received a recall notice on our 2000 Focus for hinges in areas of road salt. Door seals were added and whatever. Just bought a new 2005 Focus 2 months ago and now I get the same recall on this one. What is it Ford does not understand that owners don't like having to take a car back for recalls. Especially recalls like this one. Why was this problem not taken care of at the dealer before I bought it. Why are known recall problems not taken care of on the new cars sitting on dealers lots, instead of waiting till someone purchases them and send out a recall in cases like this??