I rember that introduction of the 850 station wagon into the touring circuit - that was a clever ploy, of course they could like everyone have used a sedan, but 75% of Volvo's sales are station wagons.
In hindsight you can say that the 850's (which spawned today's V-70ies and XC-70ies) development from scratch (in the early nineties and prior to the advent of the 850, Volvo's passenger car line was hopelessly outdated, the 740/60ies and 940/60ies used rigid rear axles which mad Volvo laughing stock of the industry) only took place to "dress the bride". The 850 proved a smash hit and made Volvo's passenger car division (which had always relied on subsidies from the highly profitable truck division) all of the sudden attractive. Ford, which bought Volvo passenger cars in 1999, never regretted the move: It is making them - unlike Jaguar and Landrover which they sold off to Indian car conglomerate Tata recently - good money. GM which bought Saab for pretty much the same reason (buying a boutique brand) is envious as Saab never got out of the red.
Having driven Volvos since the early nineties (after an initial 480 hatchback, an 850, a V 70, an XC 70 and an XC 90, my current V 70 is my sixth model, I tend to lease them for three years and then move on), I can't say there was a decline in quality since Ford took over, in fact the opposite: They are a bit more on the beat with modern technology (though still a few years behind Mercedes or BMW) and workmanship has not only become esthetically more pleasing (gone are the days where discerning the interior design of a Volvo from that of a Russian T 34 tank was hard work), but also much better, BMW quality by now (not quite Mercedes) I would say (they only reached that quality level a few years ago). And it has never bothered me that components of my Volvos might be found in Fords, in fact I find it kind of reassuring to use mass produced components - if something is built a million times you can at least hope for construction faults having been eradicated along the line of trial and error, if not for the customers then at least to not be bothered with service issues.
Uwe
