THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, May 7, 1995 TAG: 9505060294
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DAVE MAYFIELD, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Long : 102 lines
America's most profitable company of 1994 is rolling into town this week for its annual shareholders meeting. And ``roll'' is the operative word.
Ford Motor Co. is clearly on one: profits up 71 percent in the first quarter; its biggest share of the U.S. car and truck market since 1978; and, for the first time in recent memory, the top spot in total U.S. truck sales.
Ford's truck-making Norfolk Assembly Plant is the root of its vast money tree. So Thursday's shareholders meeting is a fitting homage to the factory and its workers.
About 500 people are expected for the Ford gathering at the Norfolk Waterside Marriott and Convention Center. They include Ford board members who head such companies as Coca-Cola, Hallmark Cards and Union Pacific, as well as reporters for The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and major wire services like Reuters and The Associated Press.
This city publicity director's dream come true happened with the help of some friendly pestering from Norfolk city leaders.
But Ford officials indicated it didn't take much persuading to convince the company to convene in Norfolk.
Ford's 70-year-old Norfolk plant, one of the most efficient and profitable in the company's worldwide network, has been a standard-bearer for Ford's steady climb back to respectability.
Holding the annual meeting in the plant's backyard recognizes the role that truck sales, particularly sales of F-series made in Norfolk, have played in Ford's turnaround over the past decade. F-series trucks have been America's best-selling vehicles for 13 straight years.
``We have five plants building that vehicle, and they're all running flat out,'' said William E. Boggs, the Norfolk plant's manager. ``It's the bread and butter for the company. It really is.''
City officials first floated the idea of Ford having its annual meeting in Norfolk more than four years ago. Then-Mayor Joseph A. Leafe, Councilman G. Conoly Phillips and City Development Director Robert B. Smithwick visited Ford's Dearborn, Mich., headquarters to meet with company executives about a variety of issues.
Ford had never held shareholder gatherings outside the Detroit area, but Smithwick said company executives didn't scoff at the idea. He said he kept raising the matter in follow-up meetings or phone calls. The possibility of a Norfolk meeting increased when Ford decided to hold its 1994 shareholders meeting in Cleveland.
Last December, Smithwick, Mayor Paul D. Fraim and City Manager James B. Oliver Jr. visited Ford headquarters to talk again about a range of issues. A shareholders meeting in Norfolk was one of their planned pitches. But then-Ford Vice Chairman Allan D. Gilmour informed them that the company was already considering a Norfolk gathering.
In fact, Ford had already assigned a small crew to visit Norfolk and check out the Marriott and convention center.
By early January, the company's board had voted to hold the meeting in Norfolk. Since then, Ford has twice dispatched crews of about a dozen staffers to Norfolk to hammer out the details.
``It's a stockholders meeting, first and foremost for the owners of the company. So we don't have any pyrotechnics planned. We'll save those for the auto shows,'' said Terry Bresnihan, a Ford corporate news manager who was on one of the scouting trips. ``But we do put a fair amount of planning into one of these meetings. And I must say the people in the city and at the hotel have been really great to work with so far.''
To hear Bresnihan tell it, once the company's board decided to take its shareholders meetings on the road occasionally, gathering in Norfolk was almost a no-brainer.
The fact that the Norfolk plant is celebrating its 70th anniversary this year and that it will be the lead plant for a redesigned F-series truck next model year helped seal the meeting here.
The Norfolk plant, which employs nearly 2,000 people, has inspired a lot of constructive competitiveness within Ford, a key to the company's recent success. Norfolk earns the highest quality grades among the plants making F-series trucks. The plant is also highly efficient.
Managers and employees at other plants use Norfolk's example to target improvements. That makes it harder for Norfolk to keep its edge, plant manager Boggs said. ``We're still showing a continuous improvement trend,'' he said, ``but we're having to really turn over some rocks here to do it.''
Ford has invested about $500 million in capital improvements in Norfolk in the past few years. But it has been money well-spent, said auto analyst George E. Hoffer, an economics professor at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond.
The F-series truck is ``a money tree, an absolute money tree, and the money is just going to keep on coming,'' Hoffer said.
He estimated that as much as half of Ford's $5.3 billion in net profits last year came from the sale of the full-sized pickups. While there are signs that Ford's overall sales and profits will taper off as this year goes on, its sales of F-series trucks are expected to remain strong. The truck has been widening its lead on America's No. 2-selling vehicle - the full-sized Chevrolet C-K pickups. Hoffer said with the next model year's F-series redesign, it's almost certain that lead will widen further.
``Clearly, the outlook for the Norfolk plant is very bullish,'' he said. ILLUSTRATION: Graphic
FORD ON A ROLL
SOURCES: Automotive News; George E. Hoffer, Virginia Commonwealth
University.
[For complete graphic, please see microfilm]
by CNB