Happy Trails, Mark Fields: FoMoCo To Ride Current Product Plans Into Sunset Or 2008, Whichever Comes First

At the Ford Edge drive event yesteday (yes, we're assuming our invitation to attend was probably lost in the mail) out in SanFran, Ford Prez of the Americas, Mark Fields, told reporters that FoMoCo's not going to be rushing anything new to market and the atoumaker plans to stick with current product plans through 2008. As Fields put it:

"We have to stabilize the business right now...we have to pick our shots on where we want to go out, and we have to get the business back to consistent profitability. Sometimes if we rush things just for the sake of time, there's a tendency to cut corners...I want to make sure that we're very careful about that and not let the organization get ahead of itself."

Umm, Mark? It's a bit difficult for the organization to get ahead of itself when it hasn't moved to a new product plan. But hey, the really hilarious comment from Fields was:

"The next number of quarters will be interesting, given what we are trying to accomplish."

Mark — "interesting" is how I describe an episode of Studio 60 — I'm more likely to use other words to describe the next few quarters at FoMoCo. How about "fubar" or perhaps "loss-orific" or maybe "sales-stagnant?" Hell, we'd even have taken "bold" as an appropriate adjective — but "interesting?" The man better start inspiring some confidence soon, or else FoMoCo's new big boss Al might not be willing to hear much more from him.

Ford to ride out current product plans through 2008 [Reuters via GlobeInvestor.com]

Related:
Monday! Monday! Monday! Ford Edge Preview Webcast; Breaking! Ford Announces September Sales Up 5% — Cars Up 26.2%, Trucks Down 5.4% [internal]