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Article: "People just want Ford to go'; Workers in Volvo's hometown hope brand will be sold.(Volvo Cars inc. sales dropped first quarter)
- Article from:
- Automotive News
- Article date:
- September 8, 2008
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2008 Crain Communications, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Byline: John Revill
Across the road from Volvo Cars' Torslanda factory is a shopping center called Volvo City.
Like the Swedish automaker that is one of this country's most famous brands, the battered sign on the center has seen better times.
Sales are down and losses are mounting at Volvo, which was bought by Ford in 1999. In the first quarter, Volvo's global sales dropped 7.2 percent to 109,167 units from 117,614 in 2007.
The company swung to a pretax loss of 100 million euros ($156 million) in the first quarter of this year from a year-earlier profit of $94 million. In response, 2,000 job cuts have been announced, and rumors of an ...