Land Rover increases production of new Discovery and Range Rover Sport
by Jonathon Ramsey on Aug 10th 2009 at 5:59PM 
It's a little difficult to keep track of what's happening at Tata and JLR these days. While the XF sales continue apace and the XJ is promising, the JLR division lost £673.4 million pounds ($1.11B U.S.) last year, and parent company Tata was $520 million in the red at the end of its 2008 fiscal year. Due to those numbers and a so-far unfulfilled quest for financing, Tata has been relentlessly talking up the need to shed production workers.
A report today, however, says that because of "forecasts of strong demand" for the refreshed Land Rover Discover and Range Rover Sport, the Solihull plant will increase production. Workers who've been on shortened hours since the spring will now go back to a five-day work week. That's good news for the employees and hopefully for Tata. Worker at Land Rover's Halewood plant don't fare so well: the Freelander factory will be shut down intermittently because of low demand.
[Source: What Car?]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
yosh 6:19PM (8/10/2009)
They need to refresh the lineup completely. Also bring out the LRX
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trevor2k 6:56PM (8/10/2009)
Check out the new 2010 stuff....corrects the "shortcomings" of the previous product (black plastic interior, too complicated dash, outdated nav/audio) and completely changes it for the better. Surprised that Autoblog hasn't posted on the new Sport and LR4 yet.
HotRodzNKustoms 6:26PM (8/10/2009)
I don't know if it is just that picture, but the new front bumper looks almost tacked on.
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trevor2k 6:57PM (8/10/2009)
Thats a HST version of the 2009 Sport. New 2010 looks much better.
Jonathon Ramsey 8:41PM (8/10/2009)
@ null -
To be fair to Trevor, the picture was changed. The previous photo he's referring to was a silver '09 Sport with an HST kit.
Gotham2112 6:42PM (8/10/2009)
The new cars look great so far. Our local dealer had a launch party and the refreshed Sport interior is really nice. That silver Sport pictured has a Land Rover factory HST body kit.
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Duncan 7:00PM (8/10/2009)
Too bad about the workers at the affected plant, but I don't think the world needs more Freelanders. I've never been really impressed with the whole "tough crossover" concept.
Same goes for the Jeep Patriot and (especially) the Compass. Neither does much to build my confidence in the current state of the Jeep brand - shouldn't Dodge be producing the sporty crossovers instead? Now, if Jeep made something with the size and capability of a Suzuki Grand Vitara, complete with a real two-speed transfer case and gutsy little (Fiat?) engines, I'd be all for it.
As for the body kit on the pictured Rangey, I'd much prefer it with a winch mount and a pair of real fog lights, sitting up high on a set of 31-inch mudders.
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Infra 11:58AM (8/11/2009)
I have an LR2 and I like it a lot. I live downtown Houston - the ground here is all soft clay, and the roads are terrible. It makes a great city car, easy to parallel park, and can go pretty much anywhere when you need it to.
I do use it for "offroading" (in a way). I'm an engineer for an oil company and I drive it out to rig sites and such.
It handles both crappy Houston roads built over clay and crappy lease roads built OF clay quite well.
JDM Life 7:54PM (8/10/2009)
Saw one of these and thought the owner did a custom job or something but as i looked longer I saw it was the 2010
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Anthony 10:11PM (8/10/2009)
WHAT?!?!?!?
Oh, for a second I thought I was looking at a shorter version of the Ford Flex. Phew.
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jbest05 11:06PM (8/10/2009)
I'm surprised that Land Rover would increase production during a global economic slump. Who can justify a $50,000 SUV that barely gets 15 mpg? Mark my words: Didn't Land Rover bleed ink during the previous quarter? If so, company owner Ratan Tata will probably tolerate the losses for only a for a few more years and then close shop.
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WorksForMe 10:31AM (8/11/2009)
Why would anyone buy this?
If they did any research at all, they'd find that Land Rovers come in dead LAST in reliability surveys EVERY YEAR.
I guess there are just people with more money than brains.,
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Polarstar 10:50AM (8/11/2009)
@worksforme
There's a good size segment of the car buying population that don't care about reliability gas mileage etc.
They have a certain badge/model that they want and everything else be damned.
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jessicaholland1 9:38AM (8/17/2009)
very good news for workers indeed. I agree that there will be a strong demand for them - I just love the new range rover - It just got an amzing 5 star review too at exchange and mart too http://tiny.cc/vg6lq Good blogging with you
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