Ford marketing chief opens mouth, inserts foot

Speechwriters usually urge their clients to be more provocative, not less. However.

“We’re going to beat on them, and it’s going to be fun,” said Jim Farley, Ford Motor Company’s head of global marketing, in pre-publication excerpt from a forthcoming book on cars. “F*** GM. I hate them and their company and what they stand for. And I hate the way they’re succeeding.” And finally: “I’m going to beat Chevrolet on the head with a bat. And I’m going to enjoy it.”

Uh oh.

“No one respects the competition more than Jim Farley,” Jim Farley told reporters in an abrupt about-face last week, revealing that he called his GM marketing counterpart Joel Ewanick to apologize. “I told them I respect what they’ve done.”

Louis Armstrong said it: You can say what you want with a slide trombone, but with words you gotta be careful.