[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

go, we also have no idea how low prices will go, but there is no particular use in bothering on that point. The
tractor, for instance, was first sold for $750, then at $850, then at $625, and the other day we cut it 37 per cent,
to $395. The tractor is not made in connection with the automobiles. No plant is large enough to make two
articles. A shop has to be devoted to exactly one product in order to get the real economies.
For most purposes a man with a machine is better than a man without a machine. By the ordering of design of
product and of manufacturing process we are able to provide that kind of a machine which most multiplies the
power of the hand, and therefore we give to that man a larger role of service, which means that he is entitled
to a larger share of comfort.
Keeping that principle in mind we can attack waste with a definite objective. We will not put into our
establishment anything that is useless. We will not put up elaborate buildings as monuments to our success.
The interest on the investment and the cost of their upkeep only serve to add uselessly to the cost of what is
produced--so these monuments of success are apt to end as tombs. A great administration building may be
necessary. In me it arouses a suspicion that perhaps there is too much administration. We have never found a
need for elaborate administration and would prefer to be advertised by our product than by where we make
our product.
The standardization that effects large economies for the consumer results in profits of such gross magnitude to
the producer that he can scarcely know what to do with his money. But his effort must be sincere, painstaking,
and fearless. Cutting out a half-a-dozen models is not standardizing. It may be, and usually is, only the
limiting of business, for if one is selling on the ordinary basis of profit--that is, on the basis of taking as much
money away from the consumer as he will give up--then surely the consumer ought to have a wide range of
choice.
Standardization, then, is the final stage of the process. We start with consumer, work back through the design,
and finally arrive at manufacturing. The manufacturing becomes a means to the end of service.
It is important to bear this order in mind. As yet, the order is not thoroughly understood. The price relation is
not understood. The notion persists that prices ought to be kept up. On the contrary, good business--large
consumption--depends on their going down.
CHAPTER X 68
And here is another point. The service must be the best you can give. It is considered good manufacturing
practice, and not bad ethics, occasionally to change designs so that old models will become obsolete and new
ones will have to be bought either because repair parts for the old cannot be had, or because the new model
offers a new sales argument which can be used to persuade a consumer to scrap what he has and buy
something new. We have been told that this is good business, that it is clever business, that the object of
business ought to be to get people to buy frequently and that it is bad business to try to make anything that
will last forever, because when once a man is sold he will not buy again.
Our principle of business is precisely to the contrary. We cannot conceive how to serve the consumer unless
we make for him something that, as far as we can provide, will last forever. We want to construct some kind
of a machine that will last forever. It does not please us to have a buyer's car wear out or become obsolete. We
want the man who buys one of our products never to have to buy another. We never make an improvement
that renders any previous model obsolete. The parts of a specific model are not only interchangeable with all
other cars of that model, but they are interchangeable with similar parts on all the cars that we have turned out.
You can take a car of ten years ago and, buying to-day's parts, make it with very little expense into a car of
to-day. Having these objectives the costs always come down under pressure. And since we have the firm
policy of steady price reduction, there is always pressure. Sometimes it is just harder!
Take a few more instances of saving. The sweepings net six hundred thousand dollars a year. Experiments are
constantly going on in the utilization of scrap. In one of the stamping operations six-inch circles of sheet metal
are cut out. These formerly went into scrap. The waste worried the men. They worked to find uses for the
discs. They found that the plates were just the right size and shape to stamp into radiator caps but the metal
was not thick enough. They tried a double thickness of plates, with the result that they made a cap which tests
proved to be stronger than one made out of a single sheet of metal. We get 150,000 of those discs a day. We
have now found a use for about 20,000 a day and expect to find further uses for the remainder. We saved
about ten dollars each by making transmissions instead of buying them. We experimented with bolts and
produced a special bolt made on what is called an "upsetting machine" with a rolled thread that was stronger
than any bolt we could buy, although in its making was used only about one third of the material that the
outside manufacturers used. The saving on one style of bolt alone amounted to half a million dollars a year.
We used to assemble our cars at Detroit, and although by special packing we managed to get five or six into a
freight car, we needed many hundreds of freight cars a day. Trains were moving in and out all the time. Once
a thousand freight cars were packed in a single day. A certain amount of congestion was inevitable. It is very
expensive to knock down machines and crate them so that they cannot be injured in transit--to say nothing of
the transportation charges. Now, we assemble only three or four hundred cars a day at Detroit--just enough for
local needs. We now ship the parts to our assembling stations all over the United States and in fact pretty
much all over the world, and the machines are put together there. Wherever it is possible for a branch to make
a part more cheaply than we can make it in Detroit and ship it to them, then the branch makes the part.
The plant at Manchester, England, is making nearly an entire car. The tractor plant at Cork, Ireland, is making
almost a complete tractor. This is an enormous saving of expense and is only an indication of what may be
done throughout industry generally, when each part of a composite article is made at the exact point where it
may be made most economically. We are constantly experimenting with every material that enters into the
car. We cut most of our own lumber from our own forests. We are experimenting in the manufacture of
artificial leather because we use about forty thousand yards of artificial leather a day. A penny here and a
penny there runs into large amounts in the course of a year.
The greatest development of all, however, is the River Rouge plant, which, when it is running to its full
capacity, will cut deeply and in many directions into the price of everything we make. The whole tractor plant
is now there. This plant is located on the river on the outskirts of Detroit and the property covers six hundred
and sixty-five acres--enough for future development. It has a large slip and a turning basin capable of
accommodating any lake steamship; a short-cut canal and some dredging will give a direct lake connection by
way of the Detroit River. We use a great deal of coal. This coal comes directly from our mines over the
CHAPTER X 69 [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]