Ford Motor

Ford Motor Company [pic] Morten Anders Rosenkrands LUC 2004 Table of contents 1. Introduction2 2. What is the history of the Ford Motor Company till today? 3 3. Why is the Ford losing market shares in Denmark? 4 4. What can ford do to counter act this? 5 5. What are the Ford Motor Companies plans for the future? 5 6. Conclusion6 7. Literature list7 1. Introduction In the last 100 years The Ford Motor Company has been a leading contributor to the motor industry because of its dedication to create and design cars for the future.Today Ford is losing out on some of the markets in Europe and I would like to find out why? In the following text I would like to analyze what is the history of the Ford motor Company today? Because I think it is important to look back in time to good understand how it all came to be. I would also like to analyze why is Ford losing market shares in Denmark? And further more what can Ford do to counteract this? To end it all of I am going to write about what are the Ford Motor Companies plans for the future?This should cover the question why the Ford motor Company is losing out on some of the Markets in Europe. In the text in have limited down to why is Ford losing market shares in Denmark? Because if I had taken the Ford Motor Company it would have included other motor companies like Volvo, Mazda, Lincon, Mercury, Land Rover, Jaguar and Aston Martin, and that would have been to extensive. 2. What is the history of the Ford Motor Company till today? It all started in a tiny wagon shop in Detroit staffed with about 10 people.This was the place where the second largest motor company in the world had it’s beginning. The first car the company ever made was sold to a Detroit physician. He purchased a model A Ford just one month after the company had begun. But due to failure of the model A the company was in trouble and something had to be done so the company lunched the model T which immediately became one of Ford biggest success. After 20 years of production the model T was taken off the production line. At the time Ford had sold more than a million model T’s.In 1919 Henry Ford and the companies stockholders got in a fight and they demanded that Henry Ford was taken of the post as president of the company. Henry Ford had no choice and then had to leave his company but the blood stayed in the company because Henry Ford’s son Edsel Ford took over the company. Henry Ford was not company president any more but still played a vital role in Ford because he was now head chairman. People at the time where looking for something more stylish and the model T was not it.So after the production had stooped the company went back and began production of the first model A again because it was a more stylish car but before production started it had under gone a vast improvement. In the next 4 years 4,5 million model A’s rolled of the assembly line. Ford buys Lincon. In the 1930s people began to demand more fro m their cars. They wanted luxury and power and that was exactly what Ford gave them with the Mercury, which was a whole new concept for Ford. Ford had now succeeded in becoming a company that made cars for the middle class.Before that Ford was more for the lower classes of society because of the price. Ford had in the previous years been so cheap that standards had fallen. 1945 Henrys son Edsel Ford, Fords president at the time, dies because of a car accident and Henry Ford now has to go back in the seat as Ford Motor Company’s president but at that time Henry is old and worn out so after 2 years as president Henry’s grand son Henry Ford II becomes president of the company. 2 years later Henry Ford dies as and old man at the age of 83.Edsel Ford remained president until 1960 where he stepped back and became executive officer until 1980. Edsel Ford dies in 1997. 1979 Ford buys Mazda 1987 Ford buys Aston Martin 1990 Ford buys Jaguar 1999 Ford buys Volvo Today another For d is at the steering wheel of Ford. William Clay Ford junior is the present president and CEO of the company. 3. Why is the Ford losing market shares in Denmark? In the last couple of years there has been a tendency that people more often want cars which are more gas economic and are cheaper.Ford is today neither. Ford sold in 2002 Jan-Sept 7045 cars to the Danish market. The year after it only sold Jan-Sept 5227[1] cars. One of Ford main problems today is that is does not have a very good image. People see Ford as a middle class car with low class components and not very good mileage to the liter. One of Fords other problems is that Ford has never gotten very good grades in ncap[2] tests. This also adds to Fords not so good image. 4. What can ford do to counter act this? Strengths |Weaknesses | |Good production facilities, strong leadership, good image in USA, good |Image, quality of their cars, expensive for what you get in terms of | |sales in USA, owns several other car compani es in the world, well known |quality, | |brand, | | |Opportunities |Threats | |WAT in Denmark falls, other car manufactures drop the Danish market, |Prize of oil rises, WAT rises in Denmark, more car manufactures come in | | |to the Danish market, a serious fault is found on Fords cars, | From the SWAT analysis it is easy to see what Ford needs to do if they want to change their image and sell some more cars. In the future Ford should also try to make their cars a bit cheaper so that the quality of the car and the prize are match up. If Ford wants to change their image they should try to have a better-aimed marketing strategy because today Fords marketing strategy is aimed at a very large group of people. This is not the most effective way to sell cars they should instead try to focus on more specific groups of people.The problem for the Danish market is just that people in Denmark are very affected by the gas prizes this is why a lot of fuel economic cars are bought today. So if Ford would like to sell more cars they should try to make their cars more gas economic. This I think combined with good marketing scheme could be a very effective way to sell more cars in Denmark. On the other hand Ford could make their cars more luxuries but that would not be plausible on the Danish market. 5. What are the Ford Motor Companies plans for the future? Ford Motor Company has in the latest years intensified their research in renewable fuels. What they have come up with is that cars in the future could be driving on hydrogen. The good thing about hydrogen engine is that the only exhaust it makes is water.So there would be no problems with the toxic foams cars make today. The down side about the hydrogen engine is that the speed of it is still limited. Ford does not at this time have a plan for when they are going to start producing the hydrogen car but they expect it to be on the streets within 10 years. At the time Ford is desperately trying to change their slumping ima ge by re-lunching several of their old classic cars. In the last to years Ford has re-lunched 3 of their old classics the Ford Mustang, the Ford Thunderbird and the Ford GT40. By re-lunching these models Ford is trying to relive some of the golden years they had in the 1950s and 1960s.On the American market the cars have been a limited success. Although the thunderbird was named car of the year in 2003 the market is at this time getting a little tired of the car and sales have almost stopped completely. [pic] The problem for Ford in Denmark is just that none of these new re-lunched cars are ever going to be sold on the Danish market. The reason why Ford is not going to sell these cars in Denmark is because the Danish market would never buy that kind of fuel guzzling cars. This is what I think today is one of Ford biggest problems because Ford in reality has to design to different cars one for the American market and one for the rest of the world.Almost no other car manufacturer does this they only lunch one model for the entire world. By only lunching one model they can save some money on marketing because some adds can be used on the European markets as well as on the American markets. 6. Conclusion From the text it is easy to see that Ford is a great company with a lot of history and traditions. But today history and traditions do not sell cars people have in the latest years seen an increase in oil prizes that have changed the way they look at cars today. From thinking more about quality and strength people have a tendency to want cars that are cheaper and drive longer on the fuel.This has made it difficult for Ford to compete with the some of the Chinese car manufactures witch have a long line of tradition in making cheap and fuel economic cars. One of the things Ford then could do is to make more fuel economic cars or change their strategy and make cheaper cars so that their current prize and the cars quality match. This is why Ford in the future has plan s for hydrogen cars. Ford is also at the moment trying to change their image by re-lunching so of the companies most popular cars from the 1950s and 1960s. 7. Literature list Homepages: www. ford. com www. motormagasinet. dk ———————– [1] Sales numbers from www. transportmagasinet. dk/statestikcenter/bilsalgstal-sept-2003. pdf [2] ncap is a European car test agency where they test cars in crash tests.