BlueOvalBolt
10-25-2002, 12:04 PM
I ran across this sad piece of news on AUTOEXTREMIST.COM It\'s hard to believe Ford allows this kind of thing to go on. Although not mentioned in this article, it should be noted that Safir gained control of the GT40 name only 3 years ago in 1999. In some ways, it\'s similar to losing their exclusive rights to the Cobra name.
The second article in Automotive News that caught my eye told of Bob Wood, an owner of Safir GT40 Spares Ltd. of Cincinnati. Wood, I learned, has refused to sell the Ford Motor Company rights to the GT40 name, which is owned by Safir.
You are perhaps wondering, as did I, how Ford could conceivably have lost control of the GT40 name in the first place. Lawyers, which Ford has in quantity, could tell you that, but I doubt that they could answer the question, \"Why?\" In any event, Ford lost it.
Unconstrained by the lack of a copyright, Ford had been trumpeting its new GT40 with an enthusiasm P.T. Barnum would have envied. But the car has now become the Ford GT-the name borne by the Eric Broadley-built forerunner of the GT40. So Ford GT it is, and no harm done that can\'t be rectified by a bar of Dr. Wampole\'s Egg Removing Facial Scrub. But the GT40 mess turned my mind back to my $10,000 invoice for the book review.
I read that Bob Wood had offered the GT40 name to Ford for $40 million and sensed that he is puzzled that, \"Ford was unwilling to negotiate and wouldn\'t make an offer.\" This according to the spadework done by K.C. Crain of Automotive News.
I must give Wood credit for naming a price esthetically attuned to the item he has to sell (40 and 40, get it?), but he scores no points for common sense. Would you return phone calls from a telemarketer who offered you a cruise to the Bahamas if you would pay only the sales tax of $2,765,000? I wouldn\'t-because I\'d be afraid he would find out where I live and come over some night and strangle the cat.
That\'s how Ford must have felt about so much as discussing a $40 million price tag for the GT40 name. If we assume that Ford will build as many as 5,000 Ford GTs, which it probably won\'t, Wood\'s opening shot would have cost $8,000 per unit. Wood should have asked for maybe $500 per car-which would amount to $2.5 million-and would at least have elicited a reply. But $40 million? I\'m sorry, but that sum would set off Mother Goose\'s reality alarm.
The second article in Automotive News that caught my eye told of Bob Wood, an owner of Safir GT40 Spares Ltd. of Cincinnati. Wood, I learned, has refused to sell the Ford Motor Company rights to the GT40 name, which is owned by Safir.
You are perhaps wondering, as did I, how Ford could conceivably have lost control of the GT40 name in the first place. Lawyers, which Ford has in quantity, could tell you that, but I doubt that they could answer the question, \"Why?\" In any event, Ford lost it.
Unconstrained by the lack of a copyright, Ford had been trumpeting its new GT40 with an enthusiasm P.T. Barnum would have envied. But the car has now become the Ford GT-the name borne by the Eric Broadley-built forerunner of the GT40. So Ford GT it is, and no harm done that can\'t be rectified by a bar of Dr. Wampole\'s Egg Removing Facial Scrub. But the GT40 mess turned my mind back to my $10,000 invoice for the book review.
I read that Bob Wood had offered the GT40 name to Ford for $40 million and sensed that he is puzzled that, \"Ford was unwilling to negotiate and wouldn\'t make an offer.\" This according to the spadework done by K.C. Crain of Automotive News.
I must give Wood credit for naming a price esthetically attuned to the item he has to sell (40 and 40, get it?), but he scores no points for common sense. Would you return phone calls from a telemarketer who offered you a cruise to the Bahamas if you would pay only the sales tax of $2,765,000? I wouldn\'t-because I\'d be afraid he would find out where I live and come over some night and strangle the cat.
That\'s how Ford must have felt about so much as discussing a $40 million price tag for the GT40 name. If we assume that Ford will build as many as 5,000 Ford GTs, which it probably won\'t, Wood\'s opening shot would have cost $8,000 per unit. Wood should have asked for maybe $500 per car-which would amount to $2.5 million-and would at least have elicited a reply. But $40 million? I\'m sorry, but that sum would set off Mother Goose\'s reality alarm.