Blue Oval Staff Posted November 4, 2006 Share Posted November 4, 2006 Ford Motor Co. says its sales to fleet customers will drop by double-digit percentages in 2007 now that production of the Ford Taurus has ended. ARTICLE LINK Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Extreme4x4 Posted November 4, 2006 Share Posted November 4, 2006 (edited) LOL............... and this is news how??? I think the term Duh works well here. Edited November 4, 2006 by Extreme4x4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waymondospiff Posted November 4, 2006 Share Posted November 4, 2006 LOL............... and this is news how??? Nothing beyond get ready for monthly articles on Ford's perilous sales decline. I'm still interested as to how Ford won't increase sales of other products to "back-fill" Taurus volume with rental companies. Ford has signed agreements with Avis-Budget & Hertz for large volumes of cars and smaller contracts with nearly every other company. Just because the Taurus is cancelled doesn't mean people will stop renting cars, and the companies will need other cars (Fusions & Five Hundreds) to fill the gap. Scott Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Edstock Posted November 4, 2006 Share Posted November 4, 2006 Well, don't forget the acres of unsold 300's and Chargers and Magnums, plus whatever GM pushrod delights that are in over-supply, along with the Coblat, and when those are all gone, DC has the Sebring and Aspen to fill the bill. The pound never runs out of dogs. Ford product should be rental-rare. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akirby Posted November 4, 2006 Share Posted November 4, 2006 Nothing beyond get ready for monthly articles on Ford's perilous sales decline. I'm still interested as to how Ford won't increase sales of other products to "back-fill" Taurus volume with rental companies. Ford has signed agreements with Avis-Budget & Hertz for large volumes of cars and smaller contracts with nearly every other company. Just because the Taurus is cancelled doesn't mean people will stop renting cars, and the companies will need other cars (Fusions & Five Hundreds) to fill the gap. Scott Ford said last year that it would let the other companies like GM and Hyundai have the rental fleet market. I'm sure if they needed volume to fill contracts they would have kept the Taurus longer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichardJensen Posted November 5, 2006 Share Posted November 5, 2006 George Pipas said flat out that they were dropping that volume. He was asked point blank, and gave about as unqualified answer as a corporate pointman can give, "For the most part, yes, we intend to walk away from that volume." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AAPJGK1995 Posted November 8, 2006 Share Posted November 8, 2006 Yeah maybe Ford will forgo some of the fleet sales but I doubt seriously Ford will let a sale go no matter if it is a fleet or not. Because if that was the case then they would have shut us down 2 yrs ago when it was all fleet that we were building.They will use it as part of their arguement to use against the UAW and the losses that they are taking in NA,since next sept is contract time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichardJensen Posted November 8, 2006 Share Posted November 8, 2006 Yeah maybe Ford will forgo some of the fleet sales but I doubt seriously Ford will let a sale go no matter if it is a fleet or not. Because if that was the case then they would have shut us down 2 yrs ago when it was all fleet that we were building.They will use it as part of their arguement to use against the UAW and the losses that they are taking in NA,since next sept is contract time. The gigantic loss in fleet volume is coming from a plant that is now closed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Edgey Posted November 8, 2006 Share Posted November 8, 2006 Can anybody here crunch the numbers to find out what sort of drop we are going to be looking at once the Taurus supplies are gone? How far down the totem poll will that drop Ford, behind Chrysler? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bluecon Posted November 8, 2006 Share Posted November 8, 2006 (edited) And that Atlanta plant was good for one percent of market share which they now say bye-bye too. 170,000 vehicles is one percent of 17 million. So roughly one percent is lost. Edited November 8, 2006 by Bluecon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcsario Posted November 8, 2006 Share Posted November 8, 2006 I'm seriously doubting they won't use the Focus to replace some of that volume. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichardJensen Posted November 8, 2006 Share Posted November 8, 2006 I'm seriously doubting they won't use the Focus to replace some of that volume. It's not even close to the same size. Therefore it is not a suitable replacement for rental agencies. As to the rest of the fleet buyers out there, more likely they'd opt for the fullsized Crown Vic than the "C" sized Focus, finally, Ford's only got about 20-30k excess capacity at Wayne before they need 3 shifts, and Ford ain't gonna add a 3rd shift to Wayne to build cars for Hertz. Or the Federal gov't. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J-150 Posted November 9, 2006 Share Posted November 9, 2006 Can anybody here crunch the numbers to find out what sort of drop we are going to be looking at once the Taurus supplies are gone? How far down the totem poll will that drop Ford, behind Chrysler? thinking of market share and not profit is part of what got Ford into this mess. Selling cars at a loss just to remain #1 is very asinine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Edgey Posted November 9, 2006 Share Posted November 9, 2006 thinking of market share and not profit is part of what got Ford into this mess. Selling cars at a loss just to remain #1 is very asinine. Hey, you're preaching to the choir here, I'm just curious what sort of bad news we are in for. God knows such bad news will have an enormous impact Ford's public relations. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mustang_Marty Posted November 14, 2006 Share Posted November 14, 2006 "After 21 years and sales of nearly 7 million cars, Ford has announced that it will no longer make the Taurus, forcing many thirtysomethings to find a new way to show the world they've given up on their dreams." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpd80 Posted November 14, 2006 Share Posted November 14, 2006 Ford doesn't plan to backfill the sales of the Taurus with the sales of other vehicles to daily rental fleet customers, Pipas said. "You're going to easily see a double-digit decline in the sales of vehicles to fleet customers" in 2007 compared with 2006, he said. Ford will provide more precise estimates later, Pipas said. Ford discontinued production of the Taurus on Friday, Oct. 27. In its final year, the Taurus was sold almost exclusively to fleet buyers. Even so, it had maintained its position as the Ford brand's best-selling car nameplate. Pipas said fleet deliveries of the Taurus in 2006 will end at about 175,000 vehicles. There's no point expending effort and resources building cars with little or no return. The best part about banging your head against a brick wall is the day you stop. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
macattak1 Posted November 15, 2006 Share Posted November 15, 2006 Hey, you're preaching to the choir here, I'm just curious what sort of bad news we are in for. God knows such bad news will have an enormous impact Ford's public relations. A year or two ago, maybe even more, Ford said it was pulling back significantly from the rental business. The Tarus was great, but it was worth nothin brand new and maybe a 1/3 of its MSRP after 2 years and 20k miles as a rental. Who wants to buy a car that will depreciate 50% the day you drive it off the lot? As deep as Ford got into the Rental/Fleet sales it really hurt their competativeness as the years went by. They were up over 20% of their sales to Rental and Fleet. Way too high. Toyota was around 11% if I recall. If I worked for Ford I would have mixed feelings about this. I would not want to loose my job. But I would not want to build loss vehicles or ones that shot the foot in real customers wallets. That is not smart long term job protection. Both Ford and UAW need to look towards the future and see what it brings. Airline Pilots are not making $200k a year anymore and thier pensions have been slaughtered. This is how it should be considering airlines that file for bankruptcy drop $10 bill of under insured pensions on to the tax payers and considering that the big airlines have never had a profitable year in thier lives. Like many people say, Ford must shrink some to grow stronger and bigger. Intel just laid off another 10k people. I saw the writing on the walls 4 years ago and got out last year. I was a 95% employee. I worked my butt off and did a very difficult job that no one else wanted to do. Regardless, I knew that when it came down to it that may not save my job. So I moved on before I was forced out as for the 4th time in 7 years many many more of my co-workers have been laid off. Detriot's unemployment rate in 05 was in the 15% range. I believe it is now under 10%. It is the poorest big city in the US with almost 1/2 the children living in poverty. It has got to be ugly there. While many other things have added to MI/Det's ailments, the Big Three and the UAW have considerable responsibility in this as well. Compared to other industries, UAW employees are well taken care of. http://www.uaw.org/news/prn_article.cfm?ArtId=268 http://www.uaw.org/news/091406volunarybuyo...ly%20wages' http://www.uaw.org/barg/03/barg02.cfm Ford's stock price is really in the dumper. For a company to have billions of dollars in sales each year and to have a stock price of $8 per share is rediculas. Ford really needs to grab hold of the company and figure out how they are going to buy back some of their stock, bonds, etc. Cut costs and improve quality, design, and service. They need to get control of their dealers as well. Too many of them are off on their own march and it has little to do with ensuring it is a posative thing for Ford and its customers. Peace Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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