Ford Fired Diabetic Electrician Over Stolen $1.95 Cookie Allegations

Back in May, electrician Kurt Kromm was fired by Ford after the automaker alleged that he stole a chocolate chip cookie worth $1.95. Kromm, 60, had been at Ford for 11 years, worked an average of 60 hours a week last year, made more than $200,000 a year at the company's Kentucky Truck Plant, and — as a detail that matters considering what he was accused of stealing — is diabetic.

Speaking to Shifting Gears, Kromm recalls being pulled into the labor office by his supervisor. A union bargainer eventually joined them and said, "This is bad," to Kromm before informing him of his termination. "They got you on video stealing a cookie," he was apparently told. 

For context, Kentucky is the factory responsible for building the Super Duty, Expedition, and Lincoln Navigator. Self-touted as "a model of American manufacturing," it employs 9,000 people and generates about $25 billion of revenue for Ford every year — more than the entirety of Southwest Airlines or the Marriott chain of hotels. That's enough to buy 12.8 billion chocolate chip cookies or 12.1 billion cookies if you account for Kentucky's 6% sales tax, which, knowing Ford, it definitely would.

The original Shifting Gears story is full of candid quotes from Kromm, and worth a read, but the condensed version is that Kromm felt lightheaded during an overnight Saturday shift and went to buy a cookie to get his blood sugar up. He swiped his card on one self-checkout machine which failed, but then paid with another machine, then had his cookie. He was fired, security escort and everything, exactly one week later.

A few days after that, Kromm tried to clear his name by sending bank statement screenshots with the completed cookie debit transaction to both Ford and his UAW rep. Ford then responds by requesting those bank statements be notarized before confirming with food facilities provider Aramark that the cookie, chocolate chips and all, was actually paid for. 

Kromm was offered his job back and told he would get his five weeks' lost wages paid out. But when the checks came, even those were apparently $5,000 short. For the Ford cookie counters in the crowd, $5,000 can buy approximately 2,564 cookies pre-sales tax.

While he says that he misses his job and his coworkers at Ford, the whole debacle may have been a blessing in disguise for Kromm. In between being dismissed by Ford and being invited back, he had already secured a new, higher-paying job in his hometown in Wisconsin.

We've reached out to Ford for comment, but here's the line the automaker gave Shifting Gears: "We don't talk about individual cases, but there are times when we look into things and realize it could have been handled differently. When that happens, we try to rectify it. We value our employees and want to be as fair as possible."

Look, Ford, we know times are tough and we're all trying to control expenses. But as a semi-respected car journalist who just spent way too much time thinking about chocolate chip cookies, I'm of the mind that wrongfully terminating a longtime diabetic employee over stealing a snack from the canteen of your most profitable plant is deeply embarrassing for everyone involved.