Ford truck plant changing its focus

Call it a fork in the road for America’s second-largest automaker.

Ford announced Wednesday that it is pouring $550 million into the ongoing conversion of a Michigan truck plant into a facility that will produce the Ford Focus compact – including a zero-emissions electric version of the Focus.

For 51 years, the Michigan Truck Plant in Wayne, Mich., west of Detroit, cranked out Ford Bronco sport-utility vehicles and the classic Ford F-series pickup. The plant also produced the three-ton, 14-mpg Lincoln Navigator and Ford Expedition – among the biggest SUVs on the road.

Now the facility – renamed the Michigan Assembly Plant on Wednesday – is retooling so it can build the 2,588-pound Focus, a 35-mpg fuel-sipper that pulls Ford’s hopes with its little 140-horsepower engine. Those will begin rolling off the line in late 2010; the electric Focus, a year later.

Washington Post

Spokane

Red Lion reports first quarter loss

Red Lion Hotels Corp. Wednesday reported a loss for the first quarter, and forecast continued declines throughout 2009.

Revenue for the period ending March 30 was $34.3 million, off about 13 percent from the 2008 quarter.

The net loss was $2.9 million, or 16 cents per share, compared with $4.5 million, or 25 cents per share, in 2008. The 2008 results included $3.7 million in costs attributed to the retirement of the former president and chief executive officer.

Revenue per room, room rates and occupancy all declined from year-ago levels.

President and Chief Executive Officer Anupam Narayan said cost-reduction efforts helped keep in check the decline in operating margin, from 14.9 percent in 2008 to 14.3 percent in 2009.

“We remain on track to reduce expenses in 2009 by $10 million to $12 million,” he said.

Narayan said further erosion in revenue per room lies ahead, but added that comparisons with 2008 levels should improve the second half of the year.

Bert Caldwell

Avis Rent-a-Car closes two sites

Two of the four Spokane-area Avis Rent-a-Car locations have closed, the company announced.

Both sites were associated with Sears auto centers, one near the Spokane Valley Mall and the other at NorthTown Mall.

Avis also closed stores in Tacoma and in Seattle at the end of April, said company spokesman John Barrows.

The closures were timed to the ending of leases, he added.

“The company now reviews all our off-airport locations when leases end to see if they have been meeting (performance targets),” Barrows said.

The two Spokane locations have not “been significantly viable” recently, he said.

Avis still operates a downtown Spokane location and another at the Spokane airport. It also runs a rental facility in downtown Coeur d’Alene.

Tom Sowa