January is easily the slowest selling month of the year. We don't want the inventory situation to get ahead of us. |
January sales were better than we expected at the beginning of the month. We expected them to be down 15 to 20 percent. |
January's definitely the exception, not the rule. |
Last May was a huge SUV month -- the sixth best ever for Ford, |
Next-generation mid-size cars are an area where boomers will be looking very closely, |
October wasn't a very good month for anybody, |
October wasn't a very good month for anybody. It was pretty much weak from the start and showed little improvement as the weeks progressed. |
Once we get the rate of decline starting to narrow on a year-over-year basis, then we can be thinking about stabilizing. But right now we don't have that situation. |
Our base planning assumption was not predicated on unemployment going down, |
Our goal is to increase market share in 2003. There's a long way to go...but this is a good start. |
Our main contention here is that we do expect sales to fall off from these levels that are obviously quite high, and I think it's fair to say you can't maintain a sales rate which for the industry we estimate is going to be a at or near record levels, ... If you analyze this from a macro view, it's clear there is going to be payback from this program in the year ahead. |
People that are buying are using some of the incentives in the same way they're using the interest rates on mortgages, ... There, they're buying more home or financing renovations. Here, they're buy more features on cars, or buying the next class up in cars. |
People that are buying are using some of the incentives in the same way they're using the interest rates on mortgages. There, they're buying more home or financing renovations. Here, they're buy more features on cars, or buying the next class up in cars. |
Probably the reason why '03 was lower than '02, and the reason that we don't think '04 will is necessarily going to be a blockbuster, is despite these good economic data coming in, we sold so many cars using incentives in '01 and '02, we didn't get the spring board effect you usually see, |
Probably the reason why '03 was lower than '02, and the reason that we don't think '04 will is necessarily going to be a blockbuster, is despite these good economic data coming in, we sold so many cars using incentives in '01 and '02, we didn't get the spring board effect you usually see. |