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Here was a guy who put his heart and soul in the company and one of the nice guys..I hope that William Clay Ford Jr will be given credit for attempting to save Ford Motor Company. Maybe he has cut as much as he could and still maintain some honest relations with his workers.I am not so sure about his replacement's dealings with Ford workers since I feel he will have to really cut the knife on the U.S. Operations and maybe cut out the Mercury Division. From my recent conversations with neighborhood Ford owners (with under 3 yr old auto), they seem to feel that Ford has made some strong inroads in quality. The big Mercury also rode great and soo roomy and highly rated at that!Too bad the Ford 500 wasn't optioned out with Electronic Stability Control and all other safety items..It could have been their real safety car and the plain jane looks might have attracted a following. I actually liked the design (very little wasted space and roomy).I would have seriously bought one if it was optioned with all safety devices.Got a Caddy instead.. That's my 3 cents worth.....

If... ford motor company along with the other major auto mfgs. of the USA,take responsability for their inneptitude and failure to recognize that our large cars have failed to be energy efficient and that toyota etc etc have cornered the market for economy and energy-efficient motors, then; ford and other auto mfgs will re-establish themselves, and we will be willing again to buy American, I personnaly have never owned a foreign made car, i drive a cadillac,b it does not help my pocketbook and I dont see our carmakers, promising to produce competetive models, so we can be proud of our products, and we can be again the most prestigious brands in the world. I hope they dont request tax breaks from our goverment, which lead to pay outs from our tax ridden economy- they are to blame for their predicament, and Ford is at least making a great decision, to re-organize and to lead.
it takes a good business man to know when to step aside, and look out for this important economy.
good luck Ford.

As a former Ford employee I darn near worshipped Bill Ford. But soon after he took over I noticed my pay shrinking and the red tape to get a car repaired getting longer. Indeed in 1997 I made near $60K as a top electronics technician but by 2003 I was eligible for Food Stamps. Meanwhile cars got tougher to diagnose and much harder to fix. (Take off the ENTIRE exhaust system to replace the PCV valve which put a paltry $9.00 in my pocket for a half days job, or removing the entire body on an SUV to access a smog valve!). Because of this repair debacle Ford lost quite a bit of their mid and senior repair technicians with barely educated pseudo-mechanics to fill their shoes.
Meanwhile Billy F. was pushing trucks and SUVs while at the same time sucking up to the 'Green' folks.
Poor engineering and short term 'bean counters' put Ford in their present situation and poor Bill Ford listened to them.
But I will always miss the 'Old FoMoCo' and Bill as well.

well i have been in the stock market for onlt ten years,and i have had a very good run for two yrs with FIRST ENERGY fe. does any one know if this stock ever splits.Two years ago 32.21 share,today 57.88 If any one knows e-mail me markschwartz417@aol.com thank-you MARK SCHWARTZ

I had three show room new Ford products in the 50's & 60's. They were unbelievable in lack of quality, so never again, as I went to General Motors cars. My most recent purchase in my retirement years, is a wonderful Chrysler 300 Ltd. The finest new car I have ever purchased and have never had more compliments.

I visited the Henry Ford Museum in Detroit last weekend and toured the Rouge Assembly Plant for F-150's. It's a must see destination for everyone! But I digress.What I don't get with Ford and the rest of the N.A. manufacturers is why they haven't embraced DIESEL engines. In Europe they have 50% ++ of the auto market. Forget these silly exotic hybrids, go with good old reliable diesel. Diesel gives a 30% mileage improvement. Imagine being able to cut our oil imports by 30% if all cars were diesel. The new diesels from VW and Mercedes are as quiet and clean burning as a gas engine. I know they weren't in the past, but they've improved them tremendously. And diesel fuel used to be much dirtier with 300 ppm of sulfur now down to 5 ppm (parts per million). Bottom line, great mileage and no noisy, black smoke belchers. But the short sited domestics just won't give them a chance. With the price of gas today, diesels would be a huge hit.

I am truely sorry to see such a caring and compationate individual stepping down....He is one of the nicest people I have ever had the pleasure to talk with....I wish him all the happiness in the future....Hope to talk again some day...

Although i'Am a retiree from G.M. I wieh you a lot of luck ahd to G.M. C.E.O. Until we stop the government from letting the cheap labor cars into U.S.A.The U.A.W.and C.E.O.will be walking a tight ROPE!!!

GM dropped the full size Caprice, Impala,(rear wheel drive sedan's first) in doing so, lost most of the Police, Taxi and rental car business. (those buyers shifted to the Ford LTD and larger size vehicles to please their customers. Ford failed to capitalize on this oppertunity by cutting cost, safety and relialibilty in their new found monolopoly! Building a safe/reliable full size sedan for a market that still exists in America, is still profitable and could help build the product name brand in the retail show room!!

Hmmm, sounds like a good idea, maybe with gas being the way it is, maybe a Aviation man can put it right again. I mean we build aircraft designed to the ounce. on a 747 if it is over by one pound the cost of that pound in fuel is 1 million dollars to American Airlines. I work for Boeing and we make aircraft that will fly and perform as many days out of the year as possiable. Put aviation man in, think that cars can become much more fuel efficent and much better made. Better from the mechanic side, less time to repair and owners side, less time IN the shop. Go for it Mr. Boeing

..whatever happened to Boeing anyway!!!

Hola, Canada we give you Ford!

To GM guy and whoemver...spare us your uncapitalistic and ignorantly--superimposed feelings of personal remorse for a wanting hound that couldn't retrieve the proverbial bird. Your tears are unfounded--unless you're just another redneck that is looking for a sign, symbol, or merely a last name with whom to pledge loyalty.

Bill Ford should have known that Ford Motor Co. would never survive when they started their support of homosexuals. The Bible firmly states that this life style is an abomination. Ford Motor Co. I now believe is suffering the results of their contribution to this evil life style.

I recently shopped for a new car to replace my Escape. I looked for a Ford Hybrid escape and in my area of New Jersey only one dealer had one-- a black one. I was actually frustrated that I have owned two Fords that the dealers could not get a vibration out of the front end. I finally threw in the towel with US cars and bought a Subaru outback. It may be the best engineered car I have ever owned. The handling is superb.

I have owned many many Fords over the past 22 years and own 6 Fords now . I was a Ford salesman for a year and own a 43 year old Family landscape business now. To me Ford is the #1 American Auto maker. The downfall of the big three is the fact that the usa automakers have to build cars with parts that cant be maintained. The front end of my 03 F-350 just cost me $2000.00 to repair from wear. The balljoints cant be lubricated? Driveshafts cant be lubricated? This is were they all failed. Premature wear and high costs to the owner. The sales department sold you the car so cheap the parts and service department have to get the money back from somewhere. Your pocket. This while the hondas and Toyotas drive by beeping. They(foriens) used the big three to tell them what usa wanted and then gave it to us without compromise. I like My Fords, But why cant they build them to really last?
Gm and Daimler havent had a clue for years espesially with the trucks.
GM with 31 flavors of the same car. Who wants that? A caddy today is a expensive chevy. No contention for German cars. If the Ford Family cant run the business who can?

It's amazing that this article is about ford stepping down and new leadership coming in, and yet all i can see are the words "can 'joe anybody' save the American car industry?". Then I see comments about everything from what 'ford' means, to the loss of increasing wages, to its dislike of homosexuals. The true part of this article, the part that i might add is ignored is the lack of finacial interest in this American company. They need to push the limits of technologhy and effeciancy to lead America into this upcoming hurdle. and that statment applies to all manufacturers. Oil was never an endless supply of energy, and with wars and the overall destruction of many goverments through out the world we now face the situation of destroying our own land to supply us with our gas. Lets not forget that we are "depleting the U.S. reserves of oil". and yet ford must save the American Auto Industry, wow that sounds really biased... Oh... well the log and short of it becomes, ford stands for 'fix or repair daily'
they dont give enough raises and they dont pay enough (by the way the last time i made 30,000 i put in 60 hours a week and i thought i really was doing good for myself) and they dont like alternative lifestyle. we know we dont like them, but they better save an industry and make the cars (not the trucks, lots of complaints about there mileage and there costs (for the record, S.U.V. is another way of saying truck!)) that give us the best mileage, get us the attention we want, and make people want to be like us. so with out support(buying a ford) there is no need(no demand) then there are no JOBS!
It's not the leader, its the support of the buyers.

I have owned a few Fords in my time and I'm sorry to say they were all lemons. Not to say Ford dosen't build a good car. I'v had 'em all I think. I bought a LAND ROVER and it's by far the best for the money. Ford has interest in LAND ROVER and I think they should look into incorporating some british technology into the next product line. Look what DAHLMER did for chrysler!!

Guys.........
It's not about letting in the outside econo boxes. People buy what they can afford with little thought to whatever quality they might get. American built cars , for the most part are too damn expensive in regards to long term operation. The price tag is a shocker as well. Look at the economy we have had in the last 10 years v/s corporate greed.

Bill Ford may be a nice guy but marketing has been the backbone of the car business since Harly Earl. If you can't understand why people buy cars you can't head a company. Killing your cash cow (Taurus) is the biggest marketing blunder of automotive history and it falls on his head. Not to long ago Taurus was the best selling full size car in this country and it single handedly reinvented the entire American automotive business. Ford Focus was another minor hit. In this highly competitive business and its high advertising costs success can not be ignored. It represents billions of dollars of in-place advertising. One wonders if under a more marketing savy CEO if just having named the 500 a Taurus II would have avoided Ford's econmcal downturn.

The Ford explorer fiasco which killed (how many people?) probably has something to do with Fords
demise. Bill must still be laughing that he managed
to lay the whole thing on Firestone when it was
recodnised the SUV suspension was faulty!