I’ve been in Holland for a few days now but I’ve spent so much time chatting and looking around – which has been fantastic – that I haven’t had a chance to wrap things up from Sweden. It’s always a difficult thing to say farewell to a place that means a great deal to you. I left Melbourne to go
Earlier this week, I hinted that an interview with Trollhattan’s local newspaper, TTELA,, would be forthcoming soon. The interview has been published today and as I’ve received a few concerned emails from friends about it, there are a few things I’d like to clarify. First, the headline. ‘I have given up hope’ This is not referring to Saab. People who
Some former Saab employees currently meet on Friday mornings at Innovatum, the engineering and technology hub that surrounds the Saab Museum. They get together for the social contact as well as to share some resources and advice as they make their individual trip through a collective post-Saab journey. I’m leaving Sweden today, but before I jump on a plane that’ll
A letter to my colleagues and friends at Saab Automobile Read Post »
I wrote this morning that I was feeling reassured about the future of the Saab Museum and I’m pleased to see those feelings have been vindicated. I was at O’Learys a few hours ago when word came through that the Saab Museum has been saved. A consortium consisting of the Trollhattan Municipality, supported by Saab AB and the Wallenburg Foundation
Saab Museum Saved – it’s nice to get some good news for a change Read Post »
Yesterday was a busy day and a very enjoyable one. I’ll write more detailed notes on the visits at a later date, but there’s a summary below. I guess the dominant feeling from this visit, aside from the happiness at being back here and seeing colleagues and friends again, is one of sadness. I’m coming to a better understanding of
Saab’s bankruptcy administrators, yesterday: Saab is like a patient who for a long time has bled to death. The brutal verdict is that the patient is dead, but the bleeding has not stopped. Such a large operation dies not die on its own. It takes time and costs to shut down this kind of business. Their point being that the
The recent opening of bids for the sale of cars at the Saab Museum has touched a few nerves with a lot of people, me included. I’ve been fortunate enough to spend quite a bit of time at the Saab Museum in the last four years or so and there’s always been something fascinating there to look at, discover for
I guess it’s appropriate to diarise this trip, eh? I didn’t do a Day 1 diary, but for those who’d like to know, I visited Polestar and then got on a train to Trollhattan. That’s about it (more on Polestar later, but that’s it for now). To be honest, most of Day 2 was pretty boring. I watched a few
UPDATE: Now complete, with over 200 photos and GoogleTrans text into English for the 123 vehicles from the Saab Museum that are up for sale by public tender at the end of this week. This is a really sad post to have to write. The cars from the Saab Museum are now up for sale by public tender and I
As mentioned yesterday, Auto Motor and Sport magazine in Sweden have a special section on Saab their current edition (2/2012) and I was invited to provide an article for it. As the magazine is in Swedish, I figured it would be good to provide the original English version for those of you not yet blessed with the ability to read/speak
As you can now see in various places online (like here and here), some people at Saab are starting to receive letters telling them that they will cease to be employees as of [insert appropriate date]. The call that I sat in on yesterday, the one that brought me some acute heartbreak last night, was to do with that topic.
A little more about that heartbreak post from yesterday Read Post »
