I^trestone
textiles
COMPANY
January 1981
news
Gastonia
North Carolina
Bennettsville
South Carolina Bowling Green, Kentucky
1981 Scholarship Program
March 1 is closing date for applications in this year’s Col
lege Scholarship Program. Completed applications, test
scores and all other required material are due on that date
in the Firestone Akron Scholarship office.
Among requirements are the
SAT test scores. SAT examina
tions were held on Nov. 1 and
Dec. 6, and the last one of the
1980-81 program will be on Jan
uary 24.
High school seniors who are
sons and daughters of employees
and retirees are eligible to apply
for the scholarships. Applicants
are required to be in the upper
half of their class scholastically,
and must not have a brother or
sister who has been awarded a
Firestone Scholarship. Other
eligibility requirements and de
tails are in the Scholarship
booklet which applicants re
ceived from plant Personnel of
fices.
EACH YEAR Scholarship
winners are usually announced
by early April.
From the Textiles division,
current Scholarship students are
Tina Renee Collins of Gastonia
and Jacqueline Beth Wyatt of
Bowling Green. Tina is in her
first year at Wake Forest Uni
versity, Winston-Salem, N. C.,
and Jacquenine is a senior at
Western Kentucky University,
Bowling Green.
In this academic year.
Scholarship students are receiv
ing from the company up to
$1,700 if attending a college or
university operated by the local
or state government, and up to
$3,400 if they are attending a
private institution. Scholarships
are conditional and renewable
to the four years, or less that
it takes a student to earn a bac
calaureate degree.
\
$207,335 matchino: funds ^ 007 gifts to 570 schools
• Chinaberry tree beside rail
road spur line into the Fire-
stone-Gasionia warehouse. The
ornamental tree with purple
flowers and yellow fruit (here
last season's crop) is known as
soapberry in the Southern U. S.,
Mexico and West Indies.
Colleges, universities and private second
ary schools received $207,335 in Firestone
employee/retiree gifts through the com
pany’s Matching Gift Program in fiscal
1980. Firestone matched that amount, to
make it $414,670 total for support of edu
cation through the program.
This was the largest amount contributed
in any year since the program began in
1967. The previous record of employee giv
ing vi^as $194,801 in 1979.
Since 1967, the Matching Gift Program
has sent $3,697,032 to education. Employees/
retirees and the company shared equally in
these contributions.
In the fiscal year ended last Oct. 31 there
v^ere 1,066 gifts to 603 schools, according
to Aleta J. Richmond, coordinator of Contri
butions in Akron. The 1979 figure was 1,007
gifts to 570 schools.
Of the Matching Gift Program, a Fire
stone employee, retiree or spouse of em
ployee or retiree can contribute up to
$1,000 a year to any tax-supported college or
university in the United States, or up to
$3,000 a year to any accredited private col
lege, university or secondary school.
For the company to match the amount,
the contribution must be at least $25.
Complete information and contribution
forms are available at Firestone Textiles
Company Personnel offices.
Energy saving 22 percent
In fiscal 1979-80 Firestone-Gastonia plant cut energy usage
from 773,240 million British Thermal Units to 605,604 million
BTUs. That was a 22 percent conservation rate.
Energy production efficiency per-pound product (fabric)
increased from 13.06 percent saving over 1972 (base year for
Firestone’s energy program) to a 22 percent saving.
Dan Cronin, energy-use coordinator, listed some major
factors that contributed to the plant’s energy efficiency last
year: Increased speed and better-sealed ovens on treating
units, concentration of production on the more-efficient #8
Treating Unit, removal from service of the inftr-red space
heaters, transfer of excess heat from weaving area to #3
Treating Unit, and elimination of excess lighting around
the plant.
TEXTILES
DIVISION
SERVICES
TIRE
PLANTS
Making fabric for tires is the principal task “cut out” for
us at Firestone Textiles Company. Everybody who works in
the division’s plants, knows this. Easily overlooked, though,
is the fact that we are the major supplier of reinforcement
material to Firestone’s tire-building plants, and that a good
part of the business that “keeps us going” is outside sales in
this country and to foreign markets.
In a series of meetings with employees last month. Di
vision president J. B. Call talked of how the volume of fabric
is directly keyed to the demand of products into which the
fabric is built. Again, something easily overlooked. Mostly,
this demand is tires—original equipment on new vehicles
and replacements as tires wear out.
A smaller amount goes into tires for light vehicles—
motorcycles, mopeds, motorbikes, bicycles. Still another
small volume goes into industrial products, as fanbelts,
seatbelts, webbing. Mr. Call spoke more of the two main
areas of tires that mean the most business for the Textiles
Division: Original equipment and replacement.
The slowdown we’ve experienced in the past year or so
has been due mainly to the sag in auto sales and the ad
vancing price of motor fuel. Other big causes have been the
increasing use of radial tires with their much-longer life;
and the running of smaller tires on the growing numbers of
compact cars. All this means less fabric being built into tires
these days. The average weight-per-tire has dropped to be
low a pound. And this means that our share of the business
is being “spread thinner” all the time.
IN THESE DAYS of no-growth and declining market, with
sharpening competition from all who are in the same busi
ness, profits in our industry have been below what we ought
to have had to prosper—surely below that of the average
industry in the country.
Where does this put us who continue to produce fabric for
tires? We have to prove ourselves equal to the task, and
worthy. It’s more important than ever that we do everything
we can to build the best quality possible into our portion
of the end product. And do it at the lowest cost we can
manage. The “edge” is very thin. On this our jobs depend—
literally.