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Red Curtice's new models will meet some fender-crunching competition from every other automaker. Ford has spent $185 million for the first all-new Ford body since 1949. The new car is 1 in. lower than this year's, and will have wraparound windshields. V-8 horsepower will be stepped up from 130 to around 160. Ford has also spent millions on its powerful (up to 200 h.p.) new Mercury. Fanciest eye catcher: the Montclair, a new road-hugging car that will be close to the lowest in the industry. Last week brothers Henry, Ben and Billy Ford gave everyone a taste of the rugged kind of competition that they intend to serve up. They showed off their Thunderbird sports car and put a price on it of $2,695, f.o.b. Detroit, a full $500 below Chevrolet's Corvette.
To battle G.M. and Ford, Chrysler Corp. has spent $250 million (TIME, Oct. 25). Studebaker-Packard has spent $120 million for new bodies and a new V-8 engine for Packard. Nash and Hudson (now American Motors) have redesigned, installed V-8s in their larger models to get a bigger share of the market than this year's 100,000 or so cars.
How many cars do the automakers hope to sell in 1955? For the last two years, the predictions of Red Curtice have been right on the button. Says he of 1955: "Sales will be somewhat better than this year's estimated 5,300,000 cars." As for G.M., it should keep its 49.9% of the market, biggest it has ever had.
Early this year, while fears of recession swept the U.S., Optimist Curtice boldly announced a $1 billion expansion program for G.M. This week, in his third-quarter report, Red Curtice showed that his optimism was warranted. Largely because of a 30% drop in defense business, G.M.'s sales were down from $2 billion in 1953 to $1.8 billion. But profits, helped by lower taxes, were up 14%, to $160 million. Earnings a share were $1.79 v. $1.57 in the third quarter of 1953, or a nine-month total of $6.58 a share v. $5.08 in 1953.
Out of an Ad. The man who has given General Motors its record share of the auto business* looks as if he just stepped out of a Cadillac ad. His 5 ft. 9 in., 155-Ib. frame is usually clad in flawless blues and greys; at 61, his once brick-red hair and pencil-line mustache are grey, but his bright blue eyes sparkle like a newly polished car, his smile is as broad as a Cadillac grille. His voice is quiet, his manner calm. But under the Curtice hood there throbs a machine with the tireless power of one of his own 260-h.p. engines.
For all his energy, Harlow Curtice never seems to be in a hurry. From his 30-ft.-square office in Detroit's General Motors Building, he runs G.M.'s worldwide empire with an informality that is almost offhand. His long workdays (8 a.m. to 6 or 7 p.m.) are crammed with visits from admen, engineers, lawyers, production men and especially G.M. dealers, to whom his door is always open. Several times a day he may drop in on G.M.'s styling section to see how the latest dream cars are coming along.