New AR importer in Sweden

[Taiju Kobayashi <kobao@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Wille R wrote:
>The Japaneese  pneumatik cpmpany Sumitomo has bought the Alfa/Fiat
>agency in Sweden yesterday. Hopefully this will benefit the sales
>too.

REALLY--?
Sumitomo is one of largest congromarites in Japan, whose subsidiary
Sumitomo-Rubber owns major stake of Dunlop for instance.
Actually another company Sumitomo Trading once established a subsidiary for
Alfa/Fiat dealership in Japan in mid 80's. And the result-- after a short
period of ill-sales result, they simply throw the dealership away without
making grass-root like efforts to establish service network throughout the
country. Service parts got hard to find, no service manuals at hand, and no
shop welcomed Fiat/Alfas of that era. And the Italian cars lost most of
their value in Japan.

I sincerly hope you the swedish may have benefit by new dealership, but mind
you, we have at least that story. We Japanese Alfisti never forget about
this misfortune, and hope you will not have that sort in near future.
No offence--from a pure lover of Alfa & its "history".

Taiju Kobayashi
Tokyo,Japan
'66 GTV "Corsa"
'91 75TS
(none of them through Sumitomo)

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