Edison Business

zmm < ntkviz ROBERT S. WILLIAMS/The News Tribune Finished Ford Escorts rolling along the assembly line at the company’s Edison plant Driving force in Edison After a big cutback, Ford still brings in many bucks without an increased work force,” By MIKE MORETTI ftib. Lifawnr Browning says. “ This is the price of News Tribune Staff Writer , survival.” ( Y T a u\ <t<t Last year, 120,747 Escorts and When the manager of a plant that Mercury Lynxs (since discontinued) annually pays $1.3 million in real estate were produced at the plant. Another and sales taxes talks, people listen — Ford plant, in Wayne, Mich., also particularly when he says, “ We’re makes the Escort. serious about survival.” The 1982 layoffs, Gaughan says, were Phil Staley is manager of the Ford •cum mvMCUT.-i - i n n paH- pf a recession, but currently, “Ford ait- niobt j5bi5uiar car in the hourly; 155 salaried. is doing real well, while General Motors, world last year with almost 1 million its chief competitor, is lacking. Sales oi sold — is produced. • COMPANY WAGES cars are doing well, and Ford has very On its 40th anniversary in Edison, (1987): $50.2 million. high levels of profitability as many GM which the company will celebrate on models are suffering. Tuesday, Staley says the company’s • PRODUCTION (1987): “And Ford’s employment has picked future is secure in the township. Just 120,747 Ford Escorts and up too,” he says, although that isn’t six years ago, the plant was dealt a near Mercury Lynx; 56 vehicles significant at the Edison plant. devastating blow when 1,500 employees “Ford’s expansion is a result of the were laid off — about half of the work per hour. rebounding of manufacturing in the force. • EXPENDITURES: On United States,” Gaughan says. “ The Now, 1,100 people are now employed rise of the dollar has made Japanese in production, and 155 are in salaried local goods and services, cars more expensive so consumers are supervisory and administrative $8 jrrfflion. looking to Ford and General Motors a positions. In 1987, salaries totaled more x • TAXES: Paid on real lot more closely.” than $50 million. Internally, things are strong at Ford The company spent nearly $1Q estate and sales, $1.35 mil in Edison, Staley says. million within nearby communities, lion. “ We have a strong employee says plant controller Charles Browning, involvement program,” Staley says. for things such as production supplies, “ We delegate authority for our people to transportation services xtid local feeling severe repercussions from a exercise quality control whenever they contractors. changing marketplace. feel the need to.” “The Ford plant is pretty significant “Back then, we were into a massive Staley explained there is a “ Stop” to the area,” says Patrick Gaughan of change of down-sizing our automobiles. button at each work station where an the Fords section df Woodbridge, an We had too many of the wrong types of employee can shut down the production economics professor at Fairleigh products that weren’t meeting fuel line if he or she feels there is a problem. Dickinson Upi^ersity. “With wages and restrictions and needed aerodynamic The company is producing a 1988V2 expenditure^ (totaling $60 million), it and design changes to help bring us to Ford Escort that will be unveiled has quite an impact. If you consider the the forefront,” Staley says. Tuesday. ‘multiplier effect,’ with each of those Of those laid off, some were able to The 19881/2 Escort will include a new dollars being re-spent two or three return to their jobs due to attrition. back-end design, new bumpers and side times, Ford is very important to the moldings, crisper aerodynamics and community.” Despite the reduced work force, plant now is near full working capacity, some interior changes. However, Staley The plant is so important that turning out 56 Escorts per hour. In says, the Escort will probably be Gaughan says, “ If it’s shut down, it 1982, about 52 cars were p r o d u c e d per discontinued after the 1990 model year might cause a minute recession in the hour. and may be replaced by the Ford area.” “With productivity emphasis in the Ranger, a utility vehicle. At the time of the 1982 layoffs, the intervening years, e^en though we’re “ The industry works in 10-year country’s second-largest automaker was producing more vehicles, we’re doing it See EDISON FORD Page C-9 i ROBERT S. WILLIAMS/The News Tribune ichard Dason installing an overhead map and dome light f the cars produced at Ford’s Edison plant. Edison ord ^ o O- “U : » er still a % m % Continued from Page C-8 mastime contributions of abtgut $3,000 and with a party 'for design programs. After 10 years, retarded children. they feel a model has run its Browning estimated the Edi course,” Browning says. “We’re son-based manufacturer donates currently placing a replacement in $200,000 to New Jersey for corpo its field. But because of the suc rate memberships. He is a mem cess and popularity of the Escort, ber of the state’s Chamber of they may decide to continue it.” Commerce Education Committee, Staley began as plant manager while Staley serves on the state in April 1981, then went to the Chamber of Commerce board. Kansas City plant for two years, This week, the company joined before returning to Edison last with Middlesex County College spring. and the county’s vocational and “ When I came back, the technical high schools in a cooper momentum I had put in was con ative education program called tinuing,” he says. “ It was like it ASSET, short for Automotive was when I had left it.” Student Service Educational Also, over the years, the plant Training. The program, to train has forged an excellent relation automotive technicians, was ship with the community, accord launched at a new facility adja ing to Browning. cent to the Edison assembly “ We are quite visible in the plant. community,” he says. “We sup port many hospital fund drives “All of the factors look good for and actively support college schol us in the area. Things have been arship funds. We’re also involved very profitable for this plant and in Easter Seals,” he says, referring should continue to be,” says Dis to the nationwide program that trict Manager Frank Ascione. benefits handicapped people. “The market share continues to The employees, too, contribute improve in the New York-New to the handicapped, with Christ- Jersey area.” I 10 P R O G R E S S THE HOME NEWS S k t e a h * , u s \ ft e s s SUNDAY, JANUARY 31,1988 MetroPark embodies best, worst of suburban life The Home News/Marc Ascher By GW EN SHRIFT Lunch at area restaurants, or vis Home News staff writer its to nearby green spots such as Roosevelt Park, can eat up more Two stops on the express train w .i- ■ . ub. UbnSp time than employers allow for the from Manhattan lies a workaholic’s noonday break, they said. 340 PfamfieU dreamland. It is the MetroPark off H M u a w MetroPark has a hard-working, ice complex, stronghold of com & * * & A 0B8S7 ^ • n f l R f upscale corporate atmosphere merce, all stone and mirrored glass about it, according to workers. But and corporate might, towering si that atmosphere has diluted the lently above the busy landscape of human element, according to Sam Central New Jersey. uel M. Hamill, a regonal planner, MetroPark, with 10 buildings in who called MetroPark “a bleak and Woodbridge and six in Edison, is a inhospitable environment.” sizable chunk of the kind of devel “It was probably one of the best- opment that communities like. situated sites on the eastern sea The buildings, erected during the board. It could have been designed past three decades, contribute hun {if l mm with a comprehensive plan with dreds of millions of dollars each amenities, but those opportunities year in commercial ratables to were not envisioned by the public Woodbridge and Edison. The office bodies” who approved the develop park is located near major road ment’s projects over the past three ways — Route 1, Route 27 and the decades, said Hamill, executive di Garden State Parkway. It is adja rector of the Middlesex-Somerset- cent to but distinct from the Metro Mercer Regional Council. Park railroad station. “It’s probably one of Nqw Jer There are no polluting factories sey’s outstanding regional develop among the quiet buildings, no ment failures. It could have been a smokestacks, no crowds of blue-col mixed-use center, but it’s 99 per lar laborers. cent offices, isn’t it?” There are plenty of back offices, George Ververides, Middlesex marketing executives, industrial a B s r a w r ' i County’s director of planning, said designers, researchers, bankers MetroPark’s problems are part of and other providers of the services Central New Jersey’s larger plan high-tech New Jersey increasingly ning dilemmas. “You can’t just look requires. at the site itself, you have to look at Parking deck planned the region. The county envisioned Within the next few years, Metro MetroPark as one of the regional Park may also boast a symbol of subcenters between Philadelphia corporate concentration — a park and New York. It is a type of ing deck planned at the train sta development that has occurred tion. The deck may include retail within an urban area in a growing stores, providing workers a closer county, there’s a lot of people work Mirrored glass of the Englehard building in the MetroPark office the multi-building Woodbridge/Edison complex, aggravating the place to shop than local malls or ing there, and on top of it all is the complex reflects one of its corporate neighbors.

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