Volvo, Ford Reshuffle Executives


Volvo North America late on Friday named Doug Speck as its new president and CEO, replacing Anne Belec, who will join Ford as director of global marketing.

Volvo also will move its North American headquarters from Irvine, Calif., where it has been since 2001, to Rockleigh, N.J.

Speck, 48, has served as president of sales and marketing at Volvo North America since March 2007. In his new role as CEO at Volvo, he will oversee the company's North American operations.

At Ford, Belec, 45, will be responsible for global marketing strategies and processes, brand positioning and consumer insights. She will report to Jim Farley, Ford's vp of marketing.

Belec has headed Volvo in North America for three years and has led a number of major launches and marketing initiatives. Most recently, she oversaw the launch of the C30, a small hatchback aimed at young buyers with a starting price of $22,950, which is considered inexpensive in the luxury arena.

Volvo bypassed TV and instead took the C30 campaign online last year with a series of 16 three-minute-long Webisodes on MSN.com called Mr. Robinson's Driving School, hosted by Craig Robinson, best known as Darryl on NBC's hit show The Office."

In the Webisodes, Robinson tries to show he is a worthy successor to a retiring driving school instructor by offering driving lessons in a C30.

Despite a major effort to promote the C30, sales were lower than expected. Sales of the C30 were down 8.3% last year, per Autodata, Woodcliff Lake, N.J.

In an interview with Brandweek during the North American International Auto Show in January, Belec said the C30 campaign was "spot on" in its bid to court younger consumers. Other luxury automakers were more apt to hit television with their entry-level vehicles, such as Audi's A4 and BMW's upcoming 1-Series, "but in our case, it's easy to say 'let's spend several millions on TV,' but we don't have the customers there," said Belec.

The personnel changes are effective immediately.