NAUGHTON: How does this crisis affect you as the great-grandson of Henry Ford and Harvey Firestone FORD: Personally, this has been just a horrendous period. It was very much a part of my childhood to visit my grandparents in Akron [Firestone’s former home base]. My great-grandfather founded Firestone, and my grandfather was CEO and ran the company most of his adult life. And to have my heritage so severely tarnished is extremely sad, and, frankly, it also makes me mad. But the family has been out of [running Firestone] for many years now. So it’s not the same as Ford. This is what I’m giving my life to.
Why haven’t you been more visible? This started off very much as a product recall. At some point, almost overnight, it flipped into a big public-relations and government-relations issue. But by then, Jac [Nasser] was already out front and doing a terrific job, and I thought it would be confusing, and perhaps even undermining, for me to step in at that point. That’s why I’ve been behind the scenes on this. I’ve been involved in every step of the way. I ended up not taking any vacation this summer because of this.
Did you actually cancel your vacation? I went for one day and came back. I’ve been here every single day, not sleeping, and my stomach’s been in knots.
So, are you going to appear in ads? There will come a time [for that], but it’s not yet. I’m not sure how reassuring it is for somebody who’s waiting for tires to see another person out front talking about lofty goals and making high-minded statements.
What is the future of Ford’s relationship with Firestone? We’ll do what the customer wants us to do. If the customer wants us to put those [Firestone] tires on, we will put them on. If the customer doesn’t want those tires on, we won’t. Obviously the relationship [with Firestone] is severely strained.
In Washington last week, Firestone officials said they’ve begun identifying the problem… Well, if history holds, we’ll be the last to know.
How do you feel about not knowing the cause of this problem? That’s incredibly unsettling. Until we know what the problem is, it’s going to cause us all to worry greatly.
Do you think any mistakes were made in the design of the Ford Explorer? No. When I look at the data, it suggests that it is safer than other SUVs on the road and that it is safer in a rollover than other SUVs.
