Firestone
| Bridgestone Firestone, LLC | |
|---|---|
| Company type: | Private |
| Foundation: | 1954 in Miami, Florida |
| Location: | Nashville, Tennessee |
| Use of slavery: | Liberia, Nigeria United States |
| Key people: | Mark A. Emkes, CEO |
| Industry: | Manufacturing |
| Num employees: | 23,000 |
| Revenue: | $2.09 billion USD (2004) |
| Products: | Tires |
| Homepage: | www.firestone.com |
The Firestone Tire and Rubber Company was founded by Harvey Firestone in the late 19th century to supply pneumatic tires for wagons, buggies, and other forms of wheeled transportation common in the era. Firestone soon saw the huge potential for marketing tires for automobiles and befriended Henry Ford, the first industrialist to produce them using the techniques of mass production. Firestone used this relationship to become the original equipment supplier of Ford Motor Company automobiles, and was also active in the replacement market.
History
During the 1970s, the Firestone 500 steel-belted radials where known to separate from the tread, usually at high speeds, due to water seeping under the tread, which caused the belting to rust and the treading to separate. Joan Claybrook, who was the Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) during the Firestone scandal stated before the Transportation Subcommittee United States Senate Committee on Appropriations on September 6, 2000, that "There was a documented coverup by Firestone of the 500 defect, spurred by the lack of a Firestone replacement tire."
In March 1978, NHTSA announced publically a formal investigation into defects of the Firestone 500. Firestone refused to cooperate. Firestone first asserted that only 400,000 tires produced at the Decatur plant were defective. But during the NHTSA investigation the NHTSA found that the tread separation defect was a design performance defect effecting all Firestone 500's. Firestone knew about this defect for at least three years prior and never told the NHTSA.
After forty one deaths, and after Firestone initially blamed consumers (improper repairs, rough use, or under-inflation), on Oct. 20, 1978, Firestone then recalled ten million tires.<ref name = "wired">
Firestone was originally based in Akron, Ohio, also the hometown of its archrival, Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company. Together, the two companies were the largest suppliers of automotive tires in North America for over three-quarters of a century. The family had decided in 1984 to look for a purchaser and began liquidating assets at that time.
The company was purchased off the stock market by the Japanese tire manufacturer Bridgestone in 1988. The combined Bridgestone/Firestone North American operations are now based in Nashville, Tennessee.
After the merger, allegations of defective tire designs continued, especially in 2000, when an abnormally high failure rate in their Wilderness AT, Firestone ATX, and ATX II tires resulted in multiple lawsuits, as well as an eventual mandatory recall. Ford has since stopped equipping its pickup trucks, SUVs and full-sized vans with Firestone tires. However, passenger cars such as the Ford Focus and Mercury Cougar bore Firestone tires as original equipment.
For 35 years, the company sponsored the radio and television show The Voice of Firestone.
TV ad jingle
- Wherever wheels are rolling
- No matter what the load,
- The name that's known
- Is Firestone
- Where the rubber meets the road