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Browning said the cruise control position, the placement of cup holders, air conditioning controls, seat adjustments and other items that annoy U.S. customers are being changed before cars are built. Those things hurt VW's initial quality scores with third-party ratings services such as J.D. Power and Associates and Consumer Reports magazine, he said. Now, global versions of the cars are more suited to U.S. tastes. "Those are caught at the time of development, not trying to fix after a vehicle is in the market. Obviously that takes time to work through," Browning said. Q: BMW, Chevrolet and Jeep all are introducing new fuel-efficient diesel engines in the U.S. Will diesel sales go up and your share of the diesel market go down? (VW accounts for 70 percent of diesel sales in the U.S.) A: "I see (our) share of the segment dropping. Seventy percent is a pretty dominant position, and that's unlikely to be maintained as the pond increases. What I do see is the market segment increasing and as I said, the underlying consumer interest in diesel continuing to increase," Browning said. Q: There's been talk about a German-style employee advisory board and perhaps a union at your plant in Chattanooga, Tenn. What's going on there? A: "We want our employees to have a strong voice in any operations that we run around the world, and that includes Chattanooga," Browning said. "The next step is to say the representation the employees will have will be determined by the employees through a vote. Any formal representation doesn't necessarily mean the UAW (United Auto Workers union). The management board in Germany has not taken a formal decision to my knowledge, haven't had formal discussions of this yet."
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