Volvo’s North American Truck Deliveries Fall 10% in May

[kscarbel]

Transport Topics / 6/17/2013

Volvo AB’s North American truck deliveries declined 10% in May from a year ago, the company said Monday.

Deliveries of its Volvo and Mack brands in North America declined to 4,228 trucks from 4,677 a year ago, Gothenberg, Sweden-based Volvo said in a statement.

Volvo-brand truck North American deliveries increased 10% to 2,416 trucks, while Mack’s fell 27% to 1,778.

Year-to-date North American deliveries are 27% below a year ago, at 16,172 units. (A small number of Volvo’s Renault and UD Trucks brands made up the remainder of the North American tally)

Worldwide heavy-duty truck deliveries for all Volvo brands fell 9% in May to 16,732 units. Heavy-duty trucks, which made up the majority, fell 6% to 14,318.

Volvo brand heavy-duty truck deliveries rose 5% worldwide in May to 9,560 units, while Mack’s fell 21% to 2,133.

[41180]

do you ever sleep at night or do you just eat sleep and drink volvos ownership of mack ?

[rsb502]

You cant tell on the road I see more Macks every day, they are putting Pinnacle Set Back's on the road as fast as they can letter them around here, of course there may be the issue of Macks last longer and as such dont need to be replaced as fast, or that Mack customers are tired of the Volvo influence and going elsewhere.

[41180]

yeah i see alot of new macks especially pinnacle axle forwards around here. i was at a paper mill last week and seen 2 new chu being delivered to the paper mill . they hadnt bought macks in 20 yrs before these 2

[kscarbel]

The sales year is of course cyclical. But May is typically an "up" month for everyone. If your sales are down in May, you've got serious issues.

North American Volvo-branded truck sales followed the long set trend and rose 10 percent in May to 2,416 units.

However, Mack sales for May plunged 27 percent to 1,778 units.

Sales increases and decreases of 5% to 7% are common in the industry, reflecting your expertise in sales marketing or issues within your organization.

But a 27% drop indicates major problems.

Looking at overall sales worldwide, Volvo-brand truck sales rose 5 percent in May, quite normal as I mentioned above.

But overall sales worldwide of Volvo’s Mack-branded trucks fell 21 percent to 2,133 units.

Clearly, there are problems at Volvo Trucks Sales and Marketing Americas. With stagnant European truck sales, I imagine Olof Persson isn’t pleased.

Volvo understands their home (western European) market. But outside of that region, they struggle to get solid footing.

But is this the shape of things to come? At some point, a down trend in Mack sales will be orchestrated once Volvo feels the Mack brand has “run its course” for them towards fulfilling their North American market strategy. This will allow Volvo to move forward with the master plan and terminate the Mack brand, as they did with White and GMC, simplifying all U.S. sales under the one Volvo nameplate. The media will be told “we hated to do it but the numbers fell below viable levels”. And that will be that.

[Red Horse]

The sales year is of course cyclical. But May is typically an "up" month for everyone. If your sales are down in May, you've got serious issues.

North American Volvo-branded truck sales followed the long set trend and rose 10 percent in May to 2,416 units.

However, Mack sales for May plunged 27 percent to 1,778 units.

Sales increases and decreases of 5% to 7% are common in the industry, reflecting your expertise in sales marketing or issues within your organization.

But a 27% drop indicates major problems.

Looking at overall sales worldwide, Volvo-brand truck sales rose 5 percent in May, quite normal as I mentioned above.

But overall sales worldwide of Volvo’s Mack-branded trucks fell 21 percent to 2,133 units.

Clearly, there are problems at Volvo Trucks Sales and Marketing Americas. With stagnant European truck sales, I imagine Olof Persson isn’t pleased.

Volvo understands their home (western European) market. But outside of that region, they struggle to get solid footing.

But is this the shape of things to come? At some point, a down trend in Mack sales will be orchestrated once Volvo feels the Mack brand has “run its course” for them towards fulfilling their North American market strategy. This will allow Volvo to move forward with the master plan and terminate the Mack brand, as they did with White and GMC, simplifying all U.S. sales under the one Volvo nameplate. The media will be told “we hated to do it but the numbers fell below viable levels”. And that will be that.

Monkey See-Monkey Do! Same old story- White did it to Sterling and Diamond Reo-after they did it to Reo?, Mack did it to Brockway, Daimler did it to Sterling. "Synergism" is the buzzword of the day-unfortunately. Was at the Mack Museum over the weekend- impressive changes-but I get that same uncomfortable feeling.

[kscarbel]

Monkey See-Monkey Do! Same old story- White did it to Sterling and Diamond Reo-after they did it to Reo?, Mack did it to Brockway, Daimler did it to Sterling. "Synergism" is the buzzword of the day-unfortunately. Was at the Mack Museum over the weekend- impressive changes-but I get that same uncomfortable feeling.

I hear you, but Sterling, Reo, Diamond T and Brockway were all small truckmakers that failed to evolve and impress, to ensure a viable future. You can hardly compare them to Mack Trucks.

The assumption of synergies resulting from buyouts is vastly overrated, and often a lot of hot air to win approval for the deal. Daimler couldn't find any with Chrysler. Scania and MAN couldn't identify any potential synergies.

[David]

Volvo has already killed the product. Just a matter of time before they kill the name.

[39 Baby Mack]

Hate to agree with you David, but I believe you're right.

As far as I'm concerned there's not much "Mack" left in the new Macks!

Ron

[bulldogboy]

kscarbel:

You say that Volvo- North American sales are up 10% in May and up 5% worldwide. You also say, "Clearly, there are problems at Volvo Trucks Sales and Marketing Americas". So, what's the problem for Volvo?

Sounds like things are going swell for the Volvo brand. I don't know anything about anything but I have long thought that Volvo would use the Mack brand like they did the Autocar name. Rather than discard

an iconic brand name (Mack) they would assign it to a line of heavy duty construction trucks. One of the reasons that Volvo sold off the Autocar name was to buy Mack; the government told them to discontinue

one of their LCOs, either the Mack "MR" or the Autocar "Expeditor". I know of one fire department that used Mack chassis for its tankers but has now switched to IHC because Mack is no longer Mack.

bulldogboy

[kscarbel]

kscarbel:

You say that Volvo- North American sales are up 10% in May and up 5% worldwide. You also say, "Clearly, there are problems at Volvo Trucks Sales and Marketing Americas". So, what's the problem for Volvo?

Sounds like things are going swell for the Volvo brand. I don't know anything about anything but I have long thought that Volvo would use the Mack brand like they did the Autocar name. Rather than discard an iconic brand name (Mack) they would assign it to a line of heavy duty construction trucks.

bulldogboy

Not sure I follow you. Yes, Transport Topics reported that Volvo-brand truck North American May deliveries increased 10% to 2,416 trucks.

I said there clearly are problems at Volvo Trucks Sales and Marketing Americas (the Volvo business unit responsible for the Mack brand), because Mack brand May sales fell 27% to 1,778.

Personally, I feel it would be ignorant for Volvo to limit the Mack namplate to vocational trucks. Pulling the Mack nameplate from the on-highway market would mark the beginning of the end for the brand.

The Mack name no longer has any "iconic" meaning. That ended in 2000 when Volvo purchased Mack Trucks and the legendary American truckmaker became a Swedish entity. Today's Mack is a North American Volvo chassis. You mention vocational trucks. I assume you know the Granite's "Cornerstone" chassis is a modified Volvo VHD chassis? Volvo wanted to save money and standardize on a superior Volvo platform. There's nothing iconic about that.

[jackb61sx]

At the rate Cat truck / Internationals are selling if Volvo lets Mack go down they would be a nice buyout target of Cat,,,,,Everything is speculation. Volvo makes lots of lower end cheap trucks so sales should be greater than Mack, the question comes what truck they make more profit per unit on and my bet is the Macks have a better profit margin. I know that the owner I work for is all Mack and have just ordered 10 more Visions for there Super Market Chain, they must have now 50 tractors and they love them.

[kscarbel]

At the rate Cat truck / Internationals are selling if Volvo lets Mack go down they would be a nice buyout target of Cat,,,,,Everything is speculation. Volvo makes lots of lower end cheap trucks so sales should be greater than Mack, the question comes what truck they make more profit per unit on and my bet is the Macks have a better profit margin. I know that the owner I work for is all Mack and have just ordered 10 more Visions for there Super Market Chain, they must have now 50 tractors and they love them.

You're right, the Navistar International PayStar 5000i-based Cat CT660 vocational trucks certainly aren't selling.

Cat (and Oshkosh) certainly have the financial wherewithal to purchase the Mack brand back from Volvo. But in taking on Mack, from a product standpoint, they’d almost be starting from scratch. Over half of the Mack-branded truck's content is Volvo. For example, the engines, and the "Advantage" and "Cornerstone" chassis platforms, are all Volvo global components. All CAT would have is a cab and hood, which doesn't make the deal attractive, unless CAT is extremely committed to the project.

[2stacksuperdog]

You're right, the Navistar International PayStar 5000i-based Cat CT660 vocational trucks certainly aren't selling.

Cat (and Oshkosh) certainly have the financial wherewithal to purchase the Mack brand back from Volvo. But in taking on Mack, from a product standpoint, they’d almost be starting from scratch. Over half of the Mack-branded truck's content is Volvo. For example, the engines, and the "Advantage" and "Cornerstone" chassis platforms, are all Volvo global components. All CAT would have is a cab and hood, which doesn't make the deal attractive, unless CAT is extremely committed to the project.

They bring back in Mack engineers and tell them to get to work on a MACK engine that out beats any other.

[kscarbel]

They bring back in Mack engineers and tell them to get to work on a MACK engine that out beats any other.

There's no doubt in my mind that America, with the finest talent in the world, can set the benchmark for heavy truck and powertrain design.