Ford Offering More Buyouts to Hourly Workers

Ford Motor Co. is extending another round of buyout offers to its hourly workers at more than a dozen U.S. plants as the company aligns production with weakening demand.

The company said Monday, July 21, that it would start making plant-by-plant offers on Monday, July 28, to workers at sites in Michigan and Ohio.

In the fall, the buyout program will expand to include staggered offers to employees at other locations, such as Louisville, Kentucky, said Ford spokeswoman Angie Kozleski.
 
The targeted plants will include truck and SUV plants in which Ford has cut shifts or those it has shut down temporarily.

In June, Ford made buyout offers to some of its hourly workers at Kentucky and Ohio plants.

The company plans to retool some of its U.S. plants to produce small cars, The Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday, July 19. Ford is scheduled to release second-quarter financial results Thursday, July 24.

In April, Ford said it fell short of meeting a buyout target for U.S. hourly jobs in a companywide offer made earlier this year. Ford said 4,200 workers had signed up for buyouts, but it had sought about 8,000.

Ford is offering buyouts to hourly workers at the following plants:

• The Kentucky truck plant in Louisville, which makes F-series Super Duty trucks.

• The Louisville plant that assembles the Ford Explorer and Mercury Mountaineer SUVs.

• The Michigan truck plant in Wayne, which makes the Ford Expedition and Lincoln Navigator SUVs.

• The Wayne assembly plant, which makes the Ford Focus small car.

• The Ohio assembly plant in Avon Lake, which makes Ford’s E-series vans.

• The Dearborn, Michigan, truck plant, which makes the Ford F-150 and the Lincoln Mark LT.

Filed by Craig Trudell of Automotive News, a sister publication of Workforce Management. To comment, e-mail editors@workforce.com.