unusual importance
owner
'
to every
1X1
kel
•
-
•
'
In announcing it
<"We w ill build a motor car fo r the great mul
titude. I t w ill be large enough fo r the family, but
small enough fo r the individual to run an d care
for. I t w ill be constrsscted o f the best materials,
by the best men to be hired, after the simplest
designs modern engineering can divise,i But it
The new Ford w ill sell a t
a low price
w ill be so low in price that no man making a
good salary w iil be unable to own one.1
“The new Ford has unusual speed for a
low-price car because present-day conditions
require unusual speed.
««The world moves more; quickly than it
used to. There are only so many hours jn the
day and there ism u ch to be done.
• «If I were starting in business today, or
asked to restate my policy, I would not change
one Sentence or one word o f that original
announcement. In plain, simple language it
gives the reason for the very existence o f the
Ford Motor Company and explains its growth.
“Fifty arid sixty miles an hour are desired
today where thirty and forty would have satis
fied in 1908. So w e are giving you this new
speed.
"I n
THE last nineteen years w e have made
15,000,000 Ford cats and added to the world
nearly 300,000,000 mobile horse-power. Yet
I do not consider the machines which bear my
name simply os machines. I trice them as con
crete evidence o f the working out o f a theory
o f business which I hope is something more
than a theory o f business —a theory that looks
toward making this world a better place in
which to live.
"
x
«The Model T Ford car was a pioneer. There
was no conscious public need o f motor cars
when w e first conceived it. There were few
good roads and only the ^adventurous few
could be induced to buy an automobile.
«The Ford car biased die way for the motor
industry and started the movement for good
roads. It broke down the barriers o f time and
distance and helped to place education within
the reach o f a lt It gave people more leisure.
It helped people everywhere to do more and
better work in less time and enjoy doing it.
It did a great deal, I am sure, to promote the
growth and progress o f this country.
“W c ate still proud o f die record, o f the
Model T Ford car. If w ew er e not, w e would
not have continued to manufacture k so long.
But 1927 is not 1908. It is not 1915. It is
not even 1926.
_ • .
JPe have built a new car to meet
modem conditions
«W e realise that conditions in this country
have so greatly changed in the last few years
that further refinement in motor car con
struction is desirable. So w e have built a new
•
«Every part o f it bias been tested and re
tested. There is no ¿guessing as to whether it
w ill be a successful model. It has to be.
There is no way it can escape being so, for it
represents the sum total o f all w e have learned
about motor car building in the making o f
•
«
15,000,000 automobiles.
X ^ l INETEEN years ago w e made and sold
the first Model T Ford car.
to the public w e said:
**
Quiet a n d smooth-running
a t a ll speeds
9
«The new Ford w ill ride comfortably at fifty
and sixty , miles an hour. It has actually done
sixty-five miles an hour in road tests.
car. T o put it simply— w e have built a new
and different Ford to meet new and different
conditions.
“W e believe the new Ford car, which will
be Officially announced on Friday o f this week,
is as great an improvement in motor car build
ing.as the Model T Fold was in 1908.
Sm art new low lines a n d
beautiful colors
•
“The new Ford is more than a car for the
requirements o f today. It goes farther than
that. It anticipates the~peeds o f 1928, o f 1929,
o f 1930.
“The new Ford car is radically different from
Model T. Yet the basic Ford principles of
economy o f production and quality o f prod
uct liave been retained. There is nothing quite
like the new Ford anywhere in quality andj>rice.
“The new Ford has exceptional beauty of
line and color because beauty o f line and
color has come to be considered, and I think
rightly, a necessity in a motor car today.
Equally important is the mechanical beauty o f
the engine. Let os not forget this mechanical
beauty when w e consider the beauty o f the*
, “Since modern conditions demand more
speed, they also demand better brakes to bal
ance this speed. So w e are giving you four-
whqel brakes in the new Ford.
x
«The new Ford w ill be quiet and smooth
running at all speeds and you w ill find it even
easier to handle in traffic, than the old Model
T Ford.
“The new Ford has durability because dura
bility is the very heart o f motor car value.
The Ford car has always been known as a car
that wjll take you there and bring you back.
The new Ford w ill not only do that, but it will
do it in good style. You w ill be proud of
“The price o f the new Ford is low in accor
dance with the established Ford policy. I hold
that it is better to sell a large nu/nber o f cars
at a reasonably small margin o f profit than to.
sell a few cars at a large margin o f profit.
“W e never forget that people w ho buy Ford
cars are the people w ho helped to make this
business big. It fias always been our policy to
share our profits with our customers. In one
year our profits were so much larger than w e
expected that w e voluntarily returned $50 to
each purchaser o f a car. W e could never have
done that if this business had been conducted
for the sole benefit o f stockholders rather than
to render service to the public.
“N o other automobile can duplicate the new
Ford car at the Ford price because no ocher
manufacturer does business the way w e do.
“JFe make our own steel— we make our own
glass__ w e m ine our own coal— we make virtually
every p a r t used in the Ford car. But we do not
charge a profit on any o f these items or from
these operations. We would not be playing fa ir
w ith the public i f we d id so. Our only business
is the automobile business. Our only profit is on
the automobile we sell.
“ W e are able J sell this new Ford car at a
low price because w e have found new ways to
give you greater value without a great increase
the new Ford.
in our own costs.
"T his
“W e did not set out to make a new car to
sell at such-and-such a figure. W e decided on
the kind o f car wo wanted to make apd then
new Ford car has not been planned
and made in a day. O ur, engineers began
work on it several years ago arid it has been
in my mind much longer than that. W e make
automobiles quickly when w e get in produc
tion. But we take a long time planning them.
Nothing can hurry us in that. W e spent
new Ford. ’
FORD MOTOR COMPANY
M f r o l t , M ic h ig a n
found ways to produce it at a low price.
“The new Ford car, as I have said, w ill be
officially announced on Friday o f this week.
In appearance, in performance, in comfort, in
safety, in all that goes to make a good car, it
will bear out everything I have said here. W e
consider it our most important contribution
thus far to the progress o f the motor industry,
to the prosperity o f the country, and to the
d a ily w e lfa r e o f millions o f people.”
? i