News from Notch Consulting, Inc.

Tire Business (subscription required) reports that three states — Hawaii, California and New York — have become the latest states to consider bills that would regulate the age of tires sold within their borders. In late 2008, the New Jersey Division of Consumer Affairs issued a notice of pre-proposal, soliciting comments on the feasibility of requiring the state’s tire dealers to disclose the age of the tires they sell.

The Hawaii bill would make it illegal to sell a tire more than six years after its date of manufacture, while the New York bill would require the manufacture date of the tire to be clearly molded on both sides “in a non-coded fashion.” The California bill would require all tire dealers to provide written information on sale documents about the age of each tire sold to customers, in English, Spanish, Chinese, Vietnamese, Tagalog and Korean. Customers would have to initial the information to signify they had read and understood it, and dealers would have to keep the documents for at least three years after the sale.

In his address at the company’s 2009 Annual Shareholder Meeting, Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. chairman Robert Keegan said he “remains confident in Goodyear’s ability to drive performance during challenging economic conditions and emerge in a position of competitive strength.”

Keegan identified three specific areas that the company will emphasize going forward:

Top line – encompassing new product leadership, building core brand strength and leveraging Goodyear’s industry-leading distribution network;

Lowering costs – aggressively aligning Goodyear’s cost structure with today’s lower industry volumes; and

Managing for cash – focusing on the strength of Goodyear’s balance sheet and generating funds to reinvest in the business.

Rubber and Plastics News reports (subscription required) that Keegan also outlined a restructuring program at the meeting that would reduce Goodyear’s workforce by an additional 5,000 employees, bringing its total layoffs to 9,000 workers since mid-2008. The cost reduction program also includes instituting a global freeze on salaries; lowering its manufacturing costs through shortened work weeks, fewer manufacturing personnel and reduced third-party sourcing; increasing its lean manufacturing and Six Sigma processes; eliminating non-essential spending; and continuing to close underperforming retail stores.

The press release is here.