IS HIGH PERFORMANCE IMPORTANT TO FORD MOTOR COMPANY? [GET THE LATEST "TRUTH WITH SPEEDZZTER" HERE]Ford Motor Company's rumored decision to abandon efforts to create a RWD sedan from the Australian Falcon and Speedzzter's negative reaction have triggered a debate about the importance of high performance models at Ford over on Autoblog. Red Star: Why is performance so much important? How many performance vehicles does Toyota have? NONE. And they are doing better than any other manufacturer in the world.
Speedzzter responds: 1. As any Lexus dealer will be overjoyed to tell you, Lexus (a marketing division of Toyota) offers more RWD vehicles with in excess of 280 horsepower than does the now-Jaguar-less Ford Motor Company. Moreover, Toyota has heavily marketed the performance of the DOHC V8 version of the Tundra pickup truck. So it's wholly inaccurate to claim that Toyota offers no performance vehicles.
2. Toyota is also outspending Ford on world motorsports competition, strongly suggesting that Toyota recognizes the importance of at least the perception of "performance" to a significant number of vehicle buyers.
3. Every Scion (a marketing division of Toyota) catalog from the inception of the marque has featured page-after-page of tuner information and Toyota Racing Development (TRD) parts in an effort to position the Scion brand as a credible youth market alternative to Honda, Subaru and Mitsubishi.
Thus, it's a vast oversimplification to suggest that because Toyota's mainstream sedans (Corolla, Camry, Avalon and Prius) are as bland as warm milk and as fun to drive as a flaccid rental car that Toyota has no interest in "performance."
However the success of Toyota and the other members of "Team Japan" is a far more complicated topic. A couple of other Autobloggers weighed in on that point. The Other Bob @ Mar 26th 2008 10:19PM
Red Star- The American companies already tried to "out Toyota" Toyota. That did not work. They are succesful [sic] when they return to their roots, as Chrysler used to do and GM is now doing.
Mike Ishi @ Mar 27th 2008 1:44AM
The Other Bob - (Please note that this is just my opinion.)
The American companies did an awful job at trying to beat Toyota. They didn't offer reliable, easy to love, family oriented vehicles. They didn't find a vaguely defined niche like Honda and offer reliable, easy to love, and fun vehicles over purely powerful vehicles like the pony cars of the American companies.
* * *
The American companies have to offer universality over testosterone. It changes the entire feel of the company and the company's products. It makes the company more universal. For the most part, niches aren't useful unless they're vague. And I know a lot of people will pull up the "oh yeah, but in the late 60's the pony car niche did excellent!" Well, times are completely different now and focusing too much on a "pony car" niche (that truly isn't as big as domestic fans wish it was) is an excellent way of walking closer and closer toward bankruptcy. The American companies should still offer a pony car, but leave the whole "pure performance" thing in that car and not let it trickle out into the company's other products. And here we learn the lesson of diversifying.
As a financial analyst, I have absolutely no idea how they cannot understand what they've been doing wrong for so long.
Speedzzter responds: It's a given that the bean counters always hate niches and, more specifically, performance cars. Such "specials" always offend the bean counter's inherent "lowest cost per unit" mentality. Yet the success of Toyota and the other Japanese brands cannot be reduced down to empty platitudes such as the "easy to love, fun vehicles" or "universality over testosterone."
Such oversimplification ignores both the sweep of automotive progress and the unique factors which positions Japan to capitalize on the marketing automobiles in the "regulated age" of motoring. A HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVELegendary road tester Tom McCahill once ran a retrospective comparison test between a couple of well-preserved 1946 cars with their descendants then being sold in 1966. The performance difference was virtually night and day. From the 1946 baseline, the rather ordinary, non-"muscle car", bread-and-butter 1966 sedans were supercars.
One could run a similar test between current mass market models and an average 1966 "mainstream" model today, and while the differences wouldn't be as dramatic as McCahill reported,
the modern cars would be significantly higher performing in virtually every measure. If one could somehow transport an average 2008 car back to 1966, it would be instantly viewed as a supercar and would outperform virtually 98% of what was offered for sale during the
"First Musclecar Era." The point is that progress in automobility has always focused on improved performance at ever lower relative price points. One only need to watch a collector car auction or walk through a well-stocked automobile museum to see evidence of this phenomenon. An 1886 Daimler has as much in common with a current Mercedes-Benz as a hacksaw does with a plasma cutter.
Henry Ford --
who arguably is the inventor of the "universal car" and of the mass marketing of automobiles -- could not have conceived of even the performance in a Hybrid Escape as a mass market vehicle during the days when he was promoting the Model T as the apogee of the "universal car." But the market quickly passed the Model T by, and Ford was forced to respond.
The brilliant monoblock flathead V8 eventually resulted. And Ford's "democratization" of V8 power fueled explosive growth in the social movement of "hot rodding" and created the expectation that advanced performance wasn't an entitlement limited to those who could afford large, handbuilt, state-of-the-art luxury cars. Of course, Ford's flathead V8 was soon passed by as high compression, overhead valve technology took hold.
Automotive progress, for the most part, is a history of improving the performance of virtually every aspect of motoring. Thus, what stands in a particular age as "high performance" is that which is on the leading edge of progress. However it is usually objectively benchmarked by objective and subjective factors of acceleration, lateral acceleration, deceleration, and speed. Given human psychology and physiology (which change, if at all, much more slowly than automotive evolution), our collective perceptions of legendary high performance start forming a consensus around easily recalled objective measurements and our subjective perceptions of them. Most people would "feel" that a vehicle pulling
over .8g in lateral acceleration has a high level of grip. Most would "feel" that
0-60 m.p.h. (or 0-100 k.p.h.) times of less than 6-7 seconds are quick and times under 5 seconds as extremely quick. Most would "feel" that the
ability to hit 100 m.p.h. or better in the standing start quarter mile is very potent.
Certainly, the bean counters would start pointing out the law of diminishing returns and claim that nobody "needs" such performance. Speedzzter has previously addressed many of these arguments in
"Click, Clack and the Five Hundred Horsepower Ford." Certainly, even if the "need" point is conceded for the purposes of argument, an influential and loyal segment of the automobile market "wants" such performance.
However, the important point to remember is that real progress requires continuing to "push the envelope." It requires continuing to press for greater subjective and objective performance.
We wouldn't have light, efficient twin-cam, multi-valve engines or sticky radial tires or life-saving anti-lock disc brakes as mainstream features if prior generations of automakers hadn't developed such technologies in motorsports and high-performance road cars.
German cars are held in high esteem not simply because of Germany's traditions of detailed craftsmanship.
German cars are respected and used as benchmarks (even by the Japanese) because they are typically engineered to withstand the rigors of the unlimited sections of the German Autobahns. Consequently, Germany has developed a strong tradition towards advancing the art of the automobile and broadening the availability of its performance.
America, on the other hand, has too often focused on the myopic bean counter's mentality. Although American automobility experienced significant developments in the years immediately after World War II, after 1957 Detroit's pursuit of new performance technologies
ossified toward the end of the unregulated age
(Although some of this was the fault of economic conditions and the emerging power of the trial-lawyer-driven safety lobby, the predominant American motorsports sanctioning bodies and the hegemony of the bean counters deserve the lion's share of the blame). Thus, for all of its celebration as the ultimate expression of the unregulated automobile, the 1960s American muscle car was a primitive, inefficient and under-developed machine.
The first
regulated automobiles of the 1970s and early 1980s regressed in many objective measures of performance as the automakers struggled with scores of unfunded mandates and inflationary pressures.
But the regression of the 1970s and early 1980s has proven to be an anomaly, as once regulatory stability and technology caught up, the march towards improved performance resumed in full force. It was during the doldrums of the 1970s and early 1980s that Toyota and other Japanese manufacturers started asserting their power.
The success of the Japanese has been built on a complex foundation. Japanese automakers, even in their domesticated transplants, have traditionally had a
much better labor cost structure. Japan, as a small country, has been forced to become
predatory in international trade. Japanese automakers were allowed to incubate in a totally protectionist home market and have received massive governmental subsidies at critical times from the Ministry of International Trade and Industry. Even recently, Toyota-ex Jim Press admits that
the Japanese government funded virtually 100% of the electric hybrid and battery technology that is showcased in the iconic Toyota Prius. At the same time, the U.S. government has maintained an almost adversarial relationship with Detroit automakers, only easing a bit at times -- such as when Chrysler faced bankruptcy in the late 1970s and early 1980s. With the exceptions of the so-called "chicken tariff" on imported light trucks, the Reagan Administration's voluntary import quota system, and the North American Free Trade Agreement, Washington has done almost nothing to help Detroit adjust to the world of the highly-regulated automobile. Instead, it has piled on regulation after regulation and unfunded mandate after unfunded mandate. It has sided with organized labor at most every turn (except NAFTA) and has expected the Detroit manufacturers to do more with less.
And Detroit has underwritten the vast majority of the costs for developing compliance technologies which the World's other automakers have grabbed at fractions of the price.But fundamentally, Japan had (and still has) another advantage over Detroit: a one-thousand year tradition of miniaturization and reductionism. Over twenty years ago, Tom Peters wrote the following in
Thriving on Chaos:
[I]n Smaller is Better: Japan's Mastery of the Miniature, Korean writer O-Young Lee suggests that "Japan, with its tradition of smaller is better . . . its sensitivity to information, is perfectly positioned to take the lead in the coming age of reductionism." . . . The language is the most important clue. For instance the Japanese word for "craftsmanship" is literally "delicate workmanship," and that for feminine beauty is "detailed woman. On the other hand, "large" is literally "not delicately crafted" and "worthless" is "not packed in" There are so many more prefixes, more frequently used, that mean "small" than "big." And so on.
The folding fan, miniature gardening, the tea ceremony, and other ritual staples of Japanese life all stem, according to Lee, from a passion for reductionism . . . . In fact, the Japanese are contemptuous of almost everything large, says Lee, adding "Nothing comes harder to the Japanese than living with objects of no use. They cannot bear the unnecessary, the excess." . . . "It has been a thousand years since Sei Shonagon wrote 'All things small, no matter what they are, all things are beautiful.'"
W. Edwards Deming's
statistical process control of quality and "continuous improvements" thus fell on very fertile soil when it was introduced during the post-World War II industrial reconstruction of Japan. Its focus of efficiency through quality obviously dovetailed with Japan's thousand-year tradition toward smallness, detail and miniaturized efficiency.
Thus, when it came to competing with the hastily conceived, rushed-to-market Chevrolet Vega, Ford Pinto, AMC Gremlin and other early U.S. subcompacts in the 1970s the Japanese -- and Toyota in particular -- responded with a
diverse and highly- developed FULL LINE of brilliantly miniaturized vehicles. And as the Japanese OEMs have steadily moved upmarket, they have blended their thousand-year tradition for detailed miniaturization with the best European technologies and Western aesthetics.
Detroit's cost structure and its bean-counter driven pressure for economies of scale have never permitted it to efficiently compete with "Team Japan." For three decades, Detroit has been playing catch up. But given Toyota's huge lead, merely focusing on inferior duplicates of Toyota products would not be sufficient to insure Ford's survival.
That's not to say that Ford shouldn't be focused on diversifying its small vehicle line up. Ford clearly does not have sufficient model diversity in the U.S. to take on a full-line powerhouse such as Toyota, notwithstanding any differences in perceived quality.
As Tom Peters also wrote (back in the days when Ford was setting the standard for profitability)
"There are no excellent companies. The old saw 'If it ain't broke, don't fix it' needs revision. I propose: ' If it ain't broke, you haven't looked hard enough.' Fix it anyway." Peters' philosophy is wholly consistent with a drive toward increasing the performance and efficiency of every aspect of the automobile.
Yet Ford basically coasted for over a decade on the inertia of the burst of creativity borne out of its near-death experience in the early 1980s. And for the better part of this decade, Ford has been reaping the bitter harvest of failing to advance.
Ford's D.N.A., for all of its weaknesses, contains a virulent strain of racing and performance. Toyota's heritage is as an automatic loom maker. It has to hire legions of outsiders to copy what seems inherent to the soul of Ford in motorsports. For Ford to limit this persona to a single heritage/retro "pony car" is as foolish as believing that it could fend off Toyota's diverse, highly practical model line-up in the 1970s with the Pinto, Mustang II and the imported Courier.
Ford is at the point where it can either choose to integrate the strengths of its heritage with the demands of the modern World vehicle market, or it can retreat to merely aping the current "flavor-of-the-month." Ford failed when it attempted to copy GM in the 1950s. And it will surely fail if it merely seeks to copy Toyota today.
But on the few occasions since the days of the Model T when Ford has stood out,
Ford soared when it adapted elements of its heritage with advances in the art of automobility and packaged them in practical forms that were accessable to middle-class niches. Icons such as the
Flathead V8, the
Mustang, the
Thunderbird, the
Explorer and the modern
F-series trucks are all examples where Ford took something good at its core and "hit'em where they ain't."
But a practical RWD sedan which can also be offered as a performance niche model has even more important psychological aspects.
The laws of physics and overwhelming amounts of data from motorsports prove the superiority of rear wheel drive for enthusiastic driving on most common surfaces.
Thus, RWD remains as an essential element of the modern sports/touring car. A modern RWD Ford sedan would be a statement that Ford is committed to building "athletic, state-of-the-art" vehicles on an architectural par with the market leaders in Germany and Japan (and across town at Cadillac).
It would, at a minimum, also help Ford retain its loyal performance customers when they "outgrow" pony cars, or when pure sports cars prove impractical.
Just because one's family is too large to fit in a cramped Mustang or a two-seat GT supercar doesn't mean that the alternative must be the universal blandness of an "orthopedic-shoe-on-wheels" such as an FWD Camry knock-off. There is an obvious middle ground.
Advancing the art of automobility with high performance cars also makes a statement of engineering prowess and an intention towards innovation. BMW is respected as the "Ultimate Driving Machine" because BMW has never remained complacent. Instead it has continued to push the development of all its models with a strong emphasis on high performance. Although most BMW buyers don't select an M model, the engineering and performance image of these BMW halo models permeates the entire lineup. Moreover, BWM's high performance cars are evolutions of its mainstream models. They are not just dedicated sports cars. Developing such vehicles disciplines the entire organization and helps define BMW's unique and exciting niche in the marketplace.
To anyone attending the various automotive events around the U.S.A., it's clear that
virtually all remaining enthusiasm for Ford's various brands is heavily centered around performance. Thus, Ford's largest mass of loyal customers are performance customers. One seriously doubts whether there will ever be an outpouring of enthusiasm for the boring Ford Five Hundred/New Taurus or even the SVT-less Focus, notwithstanding their obvious appeal to those bean counters who demand "cost efficiency at all costs," fuzzy niches, economies of scale, and "universal cars."
The dustbin of automotive history is littered with companies that failed because they pursued blandness and boredom instead of uniqueness and excitement. (In fact, in 1908, when Henry Ford first offered the prosaic Model T, it was muscular in comparison to legions of other cars at that price point. How many of those other companies survive today?)
To truly compete in the marketplace, it's common sense that you need to offer a product that is superior to your competitors in some aspect -- price, quality, functionality, style, value, etc. RWD performance is one area where Ford is historically and strategically positioned to offer such products. To shrink from doing so merely to imitate Toyota would be gross mismanagement.
A famous quotation from the Bible is "
So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth." (Revelation 3:16).
The surest path to oblivion is for Ford to avoid excellence and concentrate on building passionless, "lukewarm" copies of FWD Toyotas. For Ford to have any hope at surviving, it must generate excitement about its products. A RWD sedan with potential appeal to Ford's traditionalist V8 gearheads is merely one large step toward this critical goal. Labels: F-Series, Falcon, High Performance, Japan, Muscle Cars, Mustang, Rear Wheel Drive, RWD, Supercars, Thunderbird, Toyota
