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First female UPS driver celebrates 25 years of
collision-free driving
Mississauga, Ontario - UPS has honoured its first female
driver in Canada, Kathy Cianci of London, Ontario, who celebrates
25 years of collision-free driving. Over the course of her
career, she has logged more than 540,000 km without incident,
and has delivered more than one million packages. Cianci
is also the first Canadian woman inducted into UPS's "Circle
of Honour", a group of 4,202 active drivers worldwide
who have driven collision-free for 25 years or more. Headquartered
in Atlanta, Georgia, UPS celebrates its 100th anniversary
in 2007.
Toyota overtakes Lexus in Consumer Reports' annual
reliability study
Yonkers, New York - Lexus slipped to fifth place from last
year's first in new car predicted reliability, based on Consumer
Reports' Annual Car Reliability Survey, printed in the magazine's
Annual April Auto Issue. Toyota, meanwhile, moved from third
place to first. The magazine says that most models with the
best predicted reliability are from Asia, although Lincoln
and GMC improved considerably, and a few other domestics
got better over last year. However, for the second year in
a row, Mercury (no longer sold in Canada) was the only domestic
brand to land in the top ten. Lexus' drop can be attributed
to its GS models receiving only an average rating, the magazine
says. Honda remained unchanged in second place to Toyota,
while Scion (a Toyota brand not sold in Canada) moved up
to third place from seventh. The top five vehicles are all
made by Toyota or Honda. The predicted reliability score
is based on the three most recent model years' data for models
whose design has not changed for 2007, although the magazine
sometimes makes a prediction for a redesigned or new model
if the model or manufacturer has an outstanding history,
and one or two years of data might be used if the model was
new or redesigned in 2006 or 2005. Infiniti made the biggest
improvement of any brand, moving up 20 slots to eighth place,
although it is still below average, which the magazine attributes
to "the still troublesome QX56 SUV." Suzuki had
the biggest slide of any Asian brand, from 10th to 26th,
although the magazine says the fall can be linked to a 2006
redesign of the Grand Vitara, "the only Suzuki model
with sufficient data to generate a ranking." Hyundai
is also in the top ten.
Retired mechanic wins US$2 million judgment against
Ford and GM
Wilmington, Delaware - The Dallas, Texas law firm of Baron & Budd
P.C. has announced a unanimous US$2 million jury verdict
against General Motors and Ford on behalf of a retired mechanic
who contracted cancer as a result of his workplace exposure
to asbestos. Members of the jury heard that Roland Leo Grenier,
Sr., formerly of Pawtuckett, Rhode Island, was exposed to
asbestos for nearly 35 years while working as an auto mechanic
and labourer. During the course of his work, he used several
products manufactured by General Motors and Ford, including
brake and clutch mechanisms, which contained asbestos. In
2005, Grenier was diagnosed with mesothelioma, an incurable
lung cancer caused by asbestos exposure. Testimony in the
case said that officials from GM and Ford knew about the
dangers of asbestos exposure "but did nothing to protect
Mr. Greiner," the lawyers' statement says. The jury
of four men and eight women returned the verdict after ten
hours of deliberations conducted over two days. In the US$2
million compensatory damages verdict, the jury assessed 70
per cent liability against General Motors, 16 per cent against
Ford, and 2 per cent against seven other defendant companies.
Jury orders Toyota dealer to pay $3.1 million
to former employees in harassment case
Two female employees claimed their general
manager harassed them in a case that dates to 2003.
A Denver jury awarded $3.175 million to two women who
claimed they and others were sexually harassed while
working at a Toyota dealership in Denver, Colorado,
according to a report in the Denver Post. Roberta Pulse
and Tonya House sued the Larry Miller Group in 2003,
claiming that a general manager at the dealership,
then known as Denver Toyota, harassed them and then
retaliated after they complained. Ms. Pulse was a controller
at Denver Toyota; Ms. House was a finance director.
Both women were fired. They claimed the manager repeatedly
tried to touch them and made lewd and inappropriate
sexual comments. The jury delivered the verdict Jan.
30 in U.S. District Court in Denver. Representatives
of the Larry H. Miller Group - which owns dealerships
in six Western states including Colorado and other
holdings - could not be reached for comment.
5,000 applications for 18 Honda jobs
Honda Motor Co. received an "overwhelming" response
to the first job openings it posted online for a new plant
in southeastern Indiana, receiving more than 5,000 applications
for 18 positions, the company said. "We are delighted
by the enthusiastic response to our advertisement," company
spokesman Jeffrey Smith said. The 18 jobs at the facility planned
for Greensburg, about 50 miles from Indianapolis, were posted
on Feb. 21, and the company is continuing to accept applications
for four slots, Smith said. Honda temporarily stopped accepting
applications for 14 jobs so the company could evaluate the
volume of responses it already received, but the positions
may be reopened, Smith said. The first wave of job recruitment
included positions in engineering, information technology and
skilled labor. Job descriptions were posted at www.indiana.honda.com,
and applicants could upload their resumes.The plant will employ
2,000 people when it ramps up to full production capacity in
the fall of 2008, the company said.
1964: Mustang sallies forth
The first Ford Mustang was produced on this day. The Mustang
wasn't released to the public until April 16, 1964. However,
one journalist described its unveiling as "the most sensational
introduction of modern times." The Mustang was the result
of Ford's desire to make a small, sporty car which was inexpensive
enough to appeal to young car buyers, an increasingly important
market. The Mustang was the brainchild of Ford executive Lee
Iacocca. David Halberstam explained Iacocca's relationship
to the Mustang: "Outside the industry, Iacocca, who controlled
the publicity for the car, was always considered the father
of the Mustang. The Mustang was not an entirely new line of
car in the traditional sense.
In fact, Iacocca's production
team intended to make a car readily adaptable to existing Ford
parts. By making the Mustang
a Ford Falcon under the hood, Iacocca's team cut their costs
dramatically. Iacocca called the Mustang a Ford Falcon with "a
whole new skin and greenhouse." He would never have
called it that during its development, however. Iacocca stressed
the Mustang as a whole new breed of Ford: muscular, small,
and young. The base price of the car was only $2,368, but
buyers averaged over $1,000 of extra features. Iacocca said, "People
want economy so badly they don't care how much they pay for
it." Over its first two years the Mustang earned $1.1
billion in profits for Ford. Iacocca created an astounding
media blitz surrounding the car's release. He and the Mustang
made the covers of Time and Newsweek, and the car appeared
in every major business and automotive publication. Historian
Gary Witzenburg explained, "No new car in history had
ever received the publicity and attention that the media
lavished on Ford's sporty small car." One of America's
most popular car models, then, is a testament to one of America's
greatest salesman.
C L O T H E S H O R S E
“
[It’s a] Mustang with an Italian suit.”
—
Ford Motor design guru J Mays on the Mustang Giugiaro, an interpretation
by two Italian designers of the legendary muscle car
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