Again in Could, electrician Kurt Kromm was fired by Ford after the automaker alleged that he stole a chocolate chip cookie value $1.95. Kromm, 60, had been at Ford for 11 years, labored a mean of 60 hours per week final yr, made greater than $200,000 a yr on the firm’s Kentucky Truck Plant, and — as a element that issues contemplating what he was accused of stealing — is diabetic.
Chatting with Shifting Gears, Kromm recollects being pulled into the labor workplace by his supervisor. A union bargainer finally joined them and mentioned, “That is dangerous,” to Kromm earlier than informing him of his termination. “They received you on video stealing a cookie,” he was apparently instructed.
For context, Kentucky is the manufacturing facility chargeable for constructing the Tremendous Obligation, Expedition, and Lincoln Navigator. Self-touted as “a mannequin of American manufacturing,” it employs 9,000 folks and generates about $25 billion of income for Ford yearly — greater than the whole thing of Southwest Airways or the Marriott chain of lodges. That is sufficient to purchase 12.8 billion chocolate chip cookies or 12.1 billion cookies when you account for Kentucky’s 6% gross sales tax, which, realizing Ford, it positively would.
They’re investigating $1.95 transactions, guys
The unique Shifting Gears story is stuffed with candid quotes from Kromm, and value a learn, however the condensed model is that Kromm felt lightheaded throughout an in a single day Saturday shift and went to purchase a cookie to get his blood sugar up. He swiped his card on one self-checkout machine which failed, however then paid with one other machine, then had his cookie. He was fired, safety escort and every little thing, precisely one week later.
A number of days after that, Kromm tried to clear his title by sending financial institution assertion screenshots with the finished cookie debit transaction to each Ford and his UAW rep. Ford then responds by requesting these financial institution statements be notarized earlier than confirming with meals services supplier Aramark that the cookie, chocolate chips and all, was really paid for.
Kromm was supplied his job again and instructed he would get his 5 weeks’ misplaced wages paid out. However when the checks got here, even these have been apparently $5,000 quick. For the Ford cookie counters within the crowd, $5,000 should purchase roughly 2,564 cookies pre-sales tax.
Silver chocolate linings
Whereas he says that he misses his job and his coworkers at Ford, the entire debacle could have been a blessing in disguise for Kromm. In between being dismissed by Ford and being invited again, he had already secured a brand new, higher-paying job in his hometown in Wisconsin.
We have reached out to Ford for remark, however here is the road the automaker gave Shifting Gears: “We do not speak about particular person circumstances, however there are occasions after we look into issues and notice it may have been dealt with in a different way. When that occurs, we attempt to rectify it. We worth our workers and need to be as honest as doable.”
Look, Ford, we all know occasions are robust and we’re all making an attempt to regulate bills. However as a semi-respected automotive journalist who simply spent manner an excessive amount of time interested by chocolate chip cookies, I am of the thoughts that wrongfully terminating a longtime diabetic worker over stealing a snack from the canteen of your most worthwhile plant is deeply embarrassing for everybody concerned.
