"While we are mildly encouraged by the fact that the U.S. retail sales rate declined less in the first quarter than in the prior two quarters, we remain cautious and continue to expect 2009 to be an extremely challenging business environment," said Jim Ziemer, President and Chief Executive Officer of Harley-Davidson, Inc. "We continue to make good progress in executing our strategy for the economic downturn, and we will continue to manage our business with strong discipline."
But what's more important is that the American motorcycle manufacturer might be after all forced to turn to anti-recession plans, such as job cuts, as they seem the only viable solution to save money in every single area. The company has already announced back in January its intention to reduce workforce by around 800 hourly jobs during 2009 and 2010 but the plans are now slightly different.
Harley-Davidson says it needs to axe an additional 300 to 400 production jobs over the next two years, as part of its broader attempt to cope with the economic chaos. Furthermore, it once again emphasized its enthusiastic plan to ship between 264,000 and 273,000 motorcycle to dealers worldwide in 2009, which translates to a 10 percent to 13 percent reduction from 2008.
"We have a clear strategy and we expect that it will enable us to emerge from the economic downturn in a position of strength," said Ziemer. "And our team continues to execute our strategy with confidence and conviction."
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