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This terse encapsulation Ford’s alleged brand values comes courtesy of The Blue Oval’s perennially amusing crowdsourced marketing site, The Ford Story.
29 Comments on “Ask The Best And Brightest: How’s This For A New Ford Tagline?...”
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You had me until “Buy USA”. I like the patriotism and all, but it’s tough to claim “American-made” on Ford’s (or any other manufacturer’s, including the transplants) products.
Yes, I’m tired of “buy USA.” They are not USA, they are a COMPANY. Tell me what’s in it for me if I buy it, that’s what marketing is supposed to do.
John
Can’t tell if the poster is trying to be ironic. If not, don’t tell the Ford fanboy that his Fusion was built by Jorge in Sonora.
^Or about the Crown Vic, Edge, Flex, Grand Marquis, Lincoln Town Car, and MKX being built in Oakville and St. Thomas, Ontario Canada.
Nor the Transt Connect built in Turkey.
Or the Fiesta…or the new Super Doodie diesel engine…BOTH made in Mexico.
How do you say Super Duty in Spanish?
“Deber Estupendo!”
They took money, but not the money that most people know about:
Ford was the biggest winner back in June when the Department of Energy announced the first round of its $25 billion loan program for electric vehicles and battery manufacture. The company was funded with $5.9 billion through 2011 to improve the fuel efficiency of a dozen popular vehicles—from the Taurus to the F-150 truck.
Ford is also the recipient this month of two grants from the DOE’s complementary $2.4 billion grant program.
http://industry.bnet.com/auto/10002256/fords-uses-federal-money-to-accelerate-electric-car-plans/
Still, Ford is the only one of the three I would consider.
Uh, what if you’re a first generation American, wouldn’t that leave mom out of that equation? And is apple pie not somehow derived from something not American? Honda didn’t take the money either, and their Ohio built Accord is more American than Ford’s Mexican built Fusion.
Don’t forget about the Camry…which is built here and has about 80% American content…..unlike…say…the Fusion which is around 50% USA/Canadian content.
My new Honda Odyssey was made in Alabama with 75% U.S./Canadian parts content.
funny
“How is this for Ford’s new tagline?”
Well, it’s false…they did take money. And seeing as it’s false, I am sure Ford will roll with it.
Wait, wait, wait. It doesn’t say, “We didn’t take the money.” It says, “You didn’t take the money.” Well I guess that’s right since I didn’t get a m(&@*)$^%ing dime and the bank told me I make too much money to “modify” the loan on my house (bought to please a now ex-wife).
So see the Ford Fanboys got it right, “You didn’t take the money.”
Mi madre, tortillas, fries with mayo, soccer, curling, made in Mexico and Canada, Ford Motor Company. You didn’t take the money.
See I fixed it for them.
Educatordan… that was funny as hell.
You win the all too unofficial TTAC quote of the week.
That is funny. BTW, Canadians don’t eat fries with mayo. Fries with vinegar is popular in Canada, as is poutine.
Sorry I thought fries with mayo were popular in France (which is not in Canada, lest any of you think I’m geography challenged) and Quebec.
I’d love to buy USA. Who do I buy it from, the Chinese? And what’s the price, $10-20 TRLN? Maybe less with all the foreign debt. I’ll probably wait ’till next year double-dip recession to get it for cheap…
“…and we’re so very sorry we sold you and your parents that 1970 Cougar 351 whose quarter panels rusted out completely on a car only 14 months old, and that 1975 Pinto whose gas tank fell out, and that 1979 Gran Torino that died dead one day after its 90-day new car warranty. And sure, you messed up, you trusted us, and are out the equivalent in today’s money of $50,000, and we’ll never pay you back, and in fact we deserve more of your money because we wrap ourselves in the flag when it suits us.”
I have never heard of any new car that had quarter panels rust out completely in 14 months and I live in MI where the roads are heavily salted. I saw a lot of Cougars around that time because my aunt and uncle were in the LM business and I never saw one with rusted out quarter panels. Not even Japanese cars, Honda inparticular which were notorious for rust because of poor quality steel in that era.
That suggested slogan is a rip off of Chevy’s old ” Hot Dogs, Baseball, Apple Pie & Chevrolet” from the 80s.
The Big 3 played that “Buy American” crap in the 70s, the 80s the 90s & the 00s all they while they were shifting their engineering and factories overseas and still managing to build troublesome cost cut distress priced junk.
Funny how that “patiotism” only works in one direction when it comes to these ass holey bankrupt companies.
Full disclosure: I have never owned a foreign branded or built vehicle in my life and not because I wanted to show my “patriotism”.
But after the big begathon, you can forget my ever buying “American” from GM or Chrysler. Ford, maybe.
I would buy a stinking YUGO before I bought from those two corrupt stupid companies again.
Thanks to TTAC for further opening my eyes
Technically the rust was at the junction between the wheelhouse inner and the trunk floorpan, leaving gaping holes in the trunk. And, in Michigan, it took about 2 winters. So, if you bought the car in the fall, in 14 months you could have had “gaping rust holes”. Ford was eventually embarassed into fixing a lot of these casrs, but not all.
Bob
It’s always amusing when somebody starts complaining about inferior quality cars…from thirty years ago! Please…as great as our 1981 Toyota Corolla was mechanically (and it was), it started rusting way sooner than any car had a right to, and we didn’t even live in the rust belt. As a matter of fact, it spent the first 6 years of it’s life in Germany, where they don’t use salt on the roads at all. Complain about your 10-year old Taurus falling apart, and maybe it’ll seem more credible.
As for the whole “buy American” thing…as I work for the military, I am as (if not more) patriotic than most people on this site. I go back and forth on what I’m going to buy next for a vehicle…although since I refuse to buy new, I suppose it doesn’t matter much, as my purchase won’t really impact any manufacturing company. And yes, I’d venture to say that a majority of folks in America couldn’t tell you where their car was built. My wife drives our 2006 Fusion (and I’m well aware of it’s origins) and I’m punting around in my son’s 1997 Tercel (190k and counting). Heck, my uncle’s new Avalon is more “American” than our Fusion…
If Ford/GM/Chrysler really want to push the “Buy American” angle, then maybe they should, um…oh, I don’t know…build more of their cars here in America!
Whatever rust problems the 1970 Cougars may have had, they didn’t hold a candle to cars of the 50’s and 60’s. I went to college in Iowa in 1957-59, and one of my fellow students from Detroit had a 10-month-old 1957 Ford that was already starting to rust out. I saw 1955 and 1956 Buicks that the entire rear quarter panels outside the wheel cutouts had rusted away. I would think that if you were in a garage with one of those, you could have heard it rust. The 1957-1959 Chrysler products were fairly serious rusters as well. I’m not claiming that I haven’t seen 1970’s and later cars with rusted-out spots, but not nearly so many, and not so badly rusted.
My point of reference is the snow belt of Northeastern Ohio, and the salting of streets. Cars of the 70s suffered noticeably worse body rot than what we had seen in the 50s and 60s.
The 70s Cougar in question also had rot aft of the rear wheel along the bottom edge of the quarter panel. There was no metal left. As a clumsy lad I tried the cheesclothy mesh stuff impregnated with body filler. The problem was that whatever parts that were still metal that I bonded it to also eventually rotted in a few months. There was nothing left to hang filler on other than thin air.
Ford was not alone. I had a 73 Vega whose A-pillars rotted away within two years and could no longer hold the windshield. Long after the fantastic 90-day warranty, Chevy did pay to repair the A-pillars.
Rustproofing your new car at an additional 5% of the new car cost was a given. Don’t know if it helped.
My wife had a new 72 Corolla, and I later bought a 77. Neither was immune to rust, but neither was even in the same galaxy as the Ford and Chevy.
In the 70s people laughed at the Toyotas and Datsuns. They did not suddenly appear on the scene and take over. Rather, they had superior quality (including rust resistance, although that admitedly was relative), reliability, and a much cheaper price point. They didn’t take over over night, they earned it.
In the same way, Ford must earn it, not claim it as a birthright. And unless I see some serious reparation action from sins of the past, Ford won’t be first on my list (unless they maybe lower the price even more on the Mustang ragtop with the new v8…)
Guys, the prime economic rationale to “Buy American” is the profit remains in the U.S.
Guys, the prime economic rationale to “Buy American” is the profit remains in the U.S.
Fair enough. But cars are honestly not that profitable. On say $125B in sales, GM never made more than around $4B.
R&D, parts, labor, overhead staff, advertising. Those are the lion’s share of the cost of a vehicle. Profit? Meh.
In fact, if one could do $120B in sales with vehicles designed, built, assembled, managed, all done in the USA, in terms of the effect on the economy you could set the $4B in profit on fire in the driveway. Give it to the Salvation Army. Whatever.
It’s not the, what $300 (guessing) that Ford makes in profit on a Fusion. It’s who makes the steel, who makes the wire, who designs it, who assembles it, etc…
That’s where the real impact to our economy comes from. And why buying and American assembled, lotsa American sub parts, lots of American overhead staff Toyota or Honda can be better for the USA than buying a Mexinadian Ford or Chevy.
I hate to bang on this drum…
But how many tag lines are they going to go through?
Honda has had theirs for coming on 20yrs.
Nissan’s Shift.. isnt particurlally interesting.. but it does mention actually driving the car.
Toyota.. well they had What a Feeling… but now even they are slogging through this.
Id just like to know.. how much this tag line shit.. costs them every coupla years.