Harley will idle plants, lay off 730

[undeterred]

In the wake of lower first-quarter earnings despite higher revenue compared with last year, Harley-Davidson Inc. said Thursday that it will temporarily close some plants, reduce daily production and cut about 730 jobs.

The Milwaukee-based motorcycle manufacturer (NYSE: HOG) didn't say which plants it would close or where it will cut jobs. The company has about 1,000 employees at its Kansas City plant and ranks No. 43 on the Kansas City Business Journal's list of area private-sector employers. Harley-Davidson spokesman Bob Klein said in an interview that none of the roughly 370 unionized production jobs slated for cuts are in Kansas City. It's too early to know whether any of the roughly 360 nonproduction job cuts will affect Kansas City, he said. The "vast majority" of those jobs are in Milwaukee, he said.

Temporary shutdowns of partial operations will affect all of the company's plants, Klein said. Some temporary shutdowns of entire plants also could occur, he said.

The company said the actions are intended to reduce shipments by 23,000 to 27,000 motorcycles in 2008 compared with 2007, bringing shipments to between 303,500 and 307,500 units this year. "With growing weakness in the economy, U.S. retail sales of Harley-Davidson motorcycles were down 12.8 percent in the first quarter," company CEO Jim Ziemer said in a release. "We've said on a number of occasions that we would closely monitor the retail environment and regularly assess our wholesale shipment plans, and we remain committed to shipping fewer Harley-Davidson motorcycles to our worldwide dealer network than we expect they will sell this year."

The company also reported Thursday that earnings for the quarter that ended March 30 were $187.6 million, or 79 cents a share, down 2.5 percent from $192.3 million, or 74 cents a share, last year.
Revenue for the quarter was $1.31 billion, up 10.8 percent from $1.79 billion last year. Retail sales increased in all regions the company serves except North America.

http://www.bizjournals.com/kansascity/stories/2008/04/14/daily26.html