Automakers: Page

F&I is not Greek to new chairman

Closer relationships with dealer and consumer customers are a key goal of Ford Credit's new chairman and CEO, Don Winkler, former chief of the Finance One subsidiary of Bank One Corp.Mr. Winkler, 51, switched from Bank One to Ford Credit after Philippe Paillart unexpectedly gave up the Ford post to pursue an assignment.Mr. Paillart's resignation was announced by Ford President and CEO Jacques A. Nasser,

March 1, 2000

Are you wild enough?

Dealers style showrooms to get outdoorsy customers to trek on over Although it isn't likely people will be heading to the local Ford dealership to plan their next hiking trip, dealers nationwide have started to respond in major ways to a Ford Motor Co. sport/utility vehicle-advertising program.Ford has lumped all its SUVs, the Explorer, Expedition, Excursion, Explorer Sport Trac and upcoming Escape

By Jeff Green • March 1, 2000

Explore the Trendline➔

Top 5 stories from WardsAuto

Automakers are evaluating their long-term strategies, revisiting their product mix, and approach to both retail and manufacturing approach along the way.

By WardsAuto staff

Volkswagen Turns Up the Heat

Look, there's no arguing with Volkswagen AG's recent U.S. sales boom. The Passat started it, a blunt message that midsize sedans needn't be a styling snore. The perky New Beetle fanned the flames, and the restyled Jetta is the gasoline for the blaze, reaching the young - and young at heart - in embarrassingly effective fashion.Proof, then, that great styling sells. But we're told that "performance"

By Bill Visnic • March 1, 2000

Pipeline: Meritor Opens Lid on New Market

Meritor Automotive, which pioneered the one-piece roof module in Europe on the DaimlerChrysler MCC Smart car, is pushing the concept globally and now has development agreements with four automakers.The Troy, MI, supplier isn't identifying the customers except to say they are considering the modules for cars and light trucks in various markets, likely by 2004.Currently, roofs are stamped, formed and

By Tom Murphy • March 1, 2000

Brand Spanking New

It's no silver bullet - it won't solve all of General Motors Corp.'s production problems. And it definitely isn't Yellow-stone, company executives admit.But the new assembly plant now under construction in Lansing, MI, is expected to be the most efficient and flexible facility in GM's global empire. It's also a 3-D brick-and-mortar testament to the automaker's new philosophy to develop common best

By David E. Zoia • March 1, 2000

FORD TESTS NEW DEALERSHIP SIGN

A new sign to identify Ford dealerships is being tested at a store down the street from Ford Motor Co. headquarters in Dearborn, MI.By 2003, Ford Division hopes signs just like it will be completely installed at its 4,200 dealerships across the nation.The first, at Village Ford, is undergoing tests for durability and readability.The sign features the familiar blue Ford oval atop a pedestal."The blue

March 1, 2000

THE KIDS (AND GRANDKIDS) ARE ALL RIGHT

Former dealer Nat Shulman gets this magazine's last word because his column appears on the last page.This month he uses that forum to take exception to the notion that Henry Ford is the automotive person of the century.It's a provocative column, noting that Mr. Ford, while indeed an automotive pioneer, had some deep character flaws.But what's ironic to look at, too, are the lives of Henry Ford's descendants,

By Steve Finlay • March 1, 2000

Auto Talk: Arvin Wants to Clear the Air on Cobra

Wes Vance doesn't want to reopen old wounds, but he would like to clear his company's name.The president of exhaust at Arvin Industries Inc. says his company was unfairly blamed for horsepower deficiencies identified by owners of Ford Motor Co.'s '99 Mustang SVT Cobra.Owners complained that the Cobra didn't generate the advertised 320 hp, and Ford attributed much of the problem to excessive backpressure

By WARD'S AUTO WORLD STAFF • March 1, 2000

The Contrarian: Heaven Can’t Wait

Cole: Ed Cole reporting as ordered, sir.Gabriel: We're sending you back, Cole.Cole: I thought we never went back, sir.Gabriel: That's usually true, but there are exceptions, and we've got a job for you. The Big Guy always liked General Motors. You knew that. Now he's worried. He heard they are going to buy engines from Honda, and getting all-wheel-drive knowhow from Subaru. Did you hear that?Cole:

By Jerry Flint • Feb. 1, 2000

2 new Internet ties: GM-AOL, Ford-Yahoo!

GM and Ford forged agreements with two of the biggest sales and marketing players on the Internet, America Online Inc. (AOL) and Yahoo! Inc., respectively.Adding substantial clout to other Web site arrangements and their own cyber services, GM said that by midyear it would tap into AOL's 20 million subscribers, while Ford looked forward to reaching the 105 million users of Yahoo's programs."We already

Feb. 1, 2000

BY DESIGN

Ford design chief J. Mays calls it the 10-year-old-boy test: "When a kid sees a car on the street he has to instantly be able to say 'Oh, that's that fill-in-the-blank Ford.' They've got to identify it instantly and they've got to like it."And if not?Then you're toast in 2007.Automotive designers always have wanted to create cars and trucks that make kids stop and stare, but now it has turned into

By Drew Winter, Peter Robinson, Roger Schreffler, KATHERINE ZACHARY • Feb. 1, 2000

New Wheels: How High the Moon

LAGUNA BEACH, CA - It doesn't attract gawkers in this hilly southern California beach city as we tool down the main drag, Highway 1, some 45 miles (72 km) from Los Angeles.That's because outwardly it doesn't look much different than a standard 2000 Buick Regal. And you wouldn't mistake it for a typical convertible with the top down, even though it is indeed a "convertible." From the side it looks

By David C. Smith • Feb. 1, 2000

New Wheels: Focus, Exterra Nail NACOTY, NATOTY Awards

DETROIT - Mass-market customers are well-served by this year's winners of the North American Car and Truck of the Year 2000 awards. Ford Motor Co. beats out Audi AG - and its own Lincoln Div. - with the Focus subcompact besting the other NACOTY finalists, the Audi TT and Lincoln LS.Nissan Motor Co. Ltd. enjoys confirmation of its resurging market acumen, as the popular-with-the-young-buyer Xterra

By WARD'S AUTO WORLD STAFF • Feb. 1, 2000

BODY SHOP TRAINING BRINGS HIGH CSI

More than 3,400 tech-nicians have gone through Toyota's body and paint training since it began eight years ago, and it seems to be paying off."We've seen dramatic improvement in consumer satisfaction index and financial performance," says John Saia, technical & body training development manager at the Toyota Training Center in Torrance, CA. "This training is an element of that. It doesn't stand alone."It

By Tim Keenan • Feb. 1, 2000

Truck Models Growing Like Sneakers

It wasn't long ago that a single pair of sneakers was all that you needed to run, walk or jog. Today shoemakers have footgear for every imaginable activity and have most of us convinced that three pair are better than one.Automakers may never be able to aspire to such a vision with vehicles, but the new wave of sport/utility vehicles (SUVs) now coming to market point out that the segment, like footwear,

By SAID DEEP • Feb. 1, 2000

GM and its dealers “kiss and make up”

In 1998, General Motors Corp. had such bad relations with the United Auto Workers, a bunch of strikes broke out. GM spent much of 1999 making peace with the union.Last year, GM relations with its dealers went bad, turning ugly when the automaker announced a plan to buy nearly 800 dealerships.GM dealers went ballistic. They were furious - and said so, publicly. They saw the automaker's move as a turf

By Steve Finlay • Feb. 1, 2000

From dirty warehouse stunning dealership stunning to leadership

Dealer Mike McGrath knew that he faced a formidable challenge: turning a 95,000-sq.-ft. former frozen seafood processing building in downtown Chicago into a dealership worthy of Lexus's affluent heritage.Equally daunting was the task of convincing corporate Lexus that the urban site was worth the major investment."They were a little skeptical about how this big old dirty warehouse could be made into

By Laurel Wright • Feb. 1, 2000

Auto Talk: OK, Regis, Ask Nissan’s Carlos Ghosn

Regis Philbin stares intently at contestants who have just answered a question on the outrageously popular Who Wants to be a Millionaire? and asks: "Confident?"Carlos Ghosn, who wants to stop billions in red ink flowing from Nissan Motor Co. Ltd., needs no prompting: He's confident, so much so that he and his Nissan "revival" team have staked their jobs on a turnaround at Japan's No.2 automaker.A

By WARD'S AUTO WORLD STAFF • Feb. 1, 2000

A KINDER, GENTLER TIME FOR DEALERS

PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH COINED THE TERM A "kinder and gentler nation." He envisioned the American Dream as too aggressive and unforgiving in its daily pursuits.Mutual distrust has been one of the most glaring dynamics of the relationship between new-car dealers and their manufacturers.Time was when unethical dealers played havoc with warranty reimbursements as factory audit teams descended on the general

By Nat Shulman • Feb. 1, 2000

“MR. CHEAP” BUILDS UPSCALE FACILITY

FINDLAY, OH - The home of the "dirt-cheap deal" is moving to new quarters which are far from cheap.Based in a town of only 40,000 and a county of nearly twice that many, Findlay Ford-Lincoln Mercury has achieved such success that its impending new home is a $7 million complex being built right off busy I-75.Owner Stan Kujawa sees the new site as a sign of the growth Findlay Ford-LM has experienced

By Maynard M. Gordon • Feb. 1, 2000

A DEALERSHIP THAT’S TOO TALL?

Few dealerships violate local zoning codes because their buildings are too high.After all, dealership facilities are far from skyscrapers.But Bill Cook of Bill Cook Buick took some flak from the city of Farmington Hills, MI, when he planned to turn his dealership into Buick's sixth "flagship" store.Part of the flagship look is a 42-foot-high clock tower, which at ground level contains a 24-hour information

By Steve Finlay • Feb. 1, 2000

The 4s: Honda Motor Co. Ltd.

2L DOHC I-4 You just don't ignore an 8,900-rpm redline. You definitely don't ignore it when the tach in Honda Motor Co. Ltd.'s S2000 roadster sweeps past 6,000, your boot's hard on the throttle and the 2L DOHC VTEC 4-cyl. has cleared its pipes to bark the howl of Cerberus at you and every other road user in the parish.The hellish allusion is apropos. Because Honda's 2L screamer, when opened up in

By WARD'S AUTO WORLD STAFF • Jan. 1, 2000

Auto Talk: Stallkamp Lands at MSX, Talks of Merger Pitfalls

With his chances of advancement stifled at DaimlerChrysler AG, Thomas Stallkamp finally lands a top job - as vice chairman and chief executive officer at MSX International Inc.For Mr. Stallkamp, who was ousted from his job as DaimlerChrysler president at the end of the year, the new post is a fitting achievement for a man who nurtured a new era in supplier relations.Headquartered in Auburn Hills,

By WARD'S AUTO WORLD STAFF • Jan. 1, 2000

Ford Motor Co.

3.9L DOHC V-8 Hey, the Ford Motor Co. itself admits it. Right in the press kit, it says the Lincoln LS 3.9L DOHC V-8 "is derived from the acclaimed 4L AJ26 in the Jaguar XK8."A Jag engine - and a cracking good engine it is - for Lincoln money? We call that the bargain of this young century.Alright, so displacement is down a tenth of a liter from the Jag 4L (actually, it's a just a single millimeter

By WARD'S AUTO WORLD STAFF • Jan. 1, 2000

The Contrarian: Accentuate the Positive

This was going to be another column about the mistakes of the automakers, which is easy because fresh mistakes are always being made.I was going to call the column "Foibles." I would explain how killing Plymouth was dumb and would cost Chrysler business. I would explain to Jac Nasser why a table of organization is absolutely necessary (Jac seems to want to do without one) and why you get chaos without

By Jerry Flint • Jan. 1, 2000