One other concern that Jonas raised about Ford was the difficulty the company faces gearing up for production of its new aluminum-body F-150 pickup. His comment: “We believe it’s a great product that may be far less profitable than the market anticipates.”
The short version of the story is that building trucks from steel is easy; building them from aluminum is hard. Not only hard, but different. Jonas again: “As we understand it, virtually everything that makes physical contact with the vehicle in the production process has been replaced, retrained or substantially augmented.”
ALSO READ: Ford F-Series Sales Threatened by Silverado, Ram
Even companies that have been building aluminum bodied vehicles for years have trouble. A report last spring in Automotive News describes the process for building a 2014 Range Rover, which includes putting together 403 aluminum body components with 187 yards of adhesive and 3,722 rivets of 17 different types. If one rivet jams one rivet gun or is incorrectly inserted, production stops.
The Range Rover factory in Solihull, England, built 95,000 Range Rovers in 2013. Ford plans to build 650,000 F-150s a year at two plants in the United States. That works out to more than one F-150 a minute. It won’t take a very long delay to cut production substantially. And even if Ford can maintain the pace, can it maintain the quality buyers expect for a truck that will likely cost around $42,000 when decked out with a likely batch of options.
Ford has also sacrificed production of its current F-150s to the tune of about 90,000 units as it retools its Dearborn factory. The company and its dealers have also been offering incentives to buyers for the remaining inventory of steel-bodied trucks. That lowers the profit on the company’s best-selling vehicle at the same time the company is building fewer. It is no wonder the F-150 may not be an investor’s best friend right now.
Ford shares closed down about 0.4% on Friday at $13.79, after posting a 52-week low of $13.52 earlier in the day. The stock’s 52-week high is $18.12.
Top Gaining Stocks
Top Losing Stocks