PPG Earningcall Transcript Of Q2 of 2024

Vincent J. Morales -- Senior Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

And, John, this is Vince. As we said -- as Tim said in the opening remarks, we're in the normal
process working with these interested parties, working with our bankers, having traditional
management meetings, etc. So, we remain on our original schedule to determine a path forward.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Duffy Fischer with Goldman Sachs. Your line is open.
Please go ahead.

Duffy Fischer -- Analyst

Yeah, good morning, guys. A question on auto OEM. So, the numbers you put up were worse
than like if we're looking at just the global auto builds, you know, S&P or IHS. So, is that a
customer footprint issue? Is it a destocking by the customer? First -- and then do we need to
anniversary that? Are there two more quarters after this that are going to kind of be down high
single digits to get to a new level of run rate?

Timothy M. Knavish -- Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Hey, Duffy. Thanks for the question. You know our numbers, our projections may have been a bit
different than what you're seeing from some of the kind of global services -- service providers. A
couple of things there.

We do have a very strong position in Europe, which -- which was down more more than average.
And also our projections, while services maybe are looking more at macros, our projections for
Q3 in particular are based on what we actually see in specific assembly plant schedules at the
plants that we serve. And a number of them have increased, just very recently increased their
summer downtimes. So, that may have a disproportionate impact versus what you may be
seeing publicly.

And then finally, I'd say, as you know, we have a very strong position in China, and we did see a
step down in China production plans as soon as the EV tariffs were announced. And I think
some of our customers are playing it cautious here until they see how that scenario plays out
because, as you know, particularly the largest producer there is exporting quite a bit there. So,
we do think that's a transitory item that will play out.

Vincent J. Morales -- Senior Vice President, Chief Financial Officer

And, Duffy, this is Vince. Just just a point of clarification. In our materials, we provide organic
sales numbers which, for us, includes volume and price. As we've alluded to many times this
year, in this business and in our industrial segment, we have index-based pricing.

So, excluding price, we're much closer to the service provider numbers that you alluded to in
your question. So, you have to bifurcate price versus volume.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Ghansham Panjabi with Baird. Your line is open.
Please go ahead.

Ghansham Panjabi -- Analyst

Yes. Good morning. Thank you. Tim, can you give us a bit more color on the volume trend line in
Europe during the second quarter? You know, you mentioned it was a bit below your forecast.

Which specific businesses perhaps were a little bit below ? I think you called out auto OEM. And
then secondly, you know, in terms of the flattish volumes on a consolidated basis year over year
for 2Q and the margin improvement which was quite significant, can you just give us some of
the high-level drivers of that?

Timothy M. Knavish -- Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Sure, Ghansham. Thank you for the questions. Yeah. The volume -- the volume trend in Q2 did
play out a little worse than we expected, particularly at the end of the quarter.