How to save Harley Davidison
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From: The Older Gentleman on 17 Jul 2010 08:36 J. Clarke <jclarke.usenet(a)cox.net> wrote: > But the bike division isn't a stand-alone and that's the whole > point--the bike division has the resources of all of BMW to call on--the > test tracks and the supercomputers and the research labs and the wind > tunnels and the bank accounts and the whole nine yards. Yes. I'd be surprised if the coporate accounting doesn't rquire the bike division to 'pay' for them, though, in the sense that "Three hours in the wind tunnel means umpteen thousand euros off your bottom line." Other companies do it that way. Dunno about BMW. > And if their > motorcycle sales falter, management can choose to prop them up with > money from the other parts of the business while they develop and > implement a corrective strategy. Harley doesn't have that--if V-twin > cruisers and touring bikes stop selling Harley's _dead_. Agreed. -- BMW K1100LT Ducati 750SS Honda CB400F Triumph Street Triple Suzuki TS250ER GN250 Damn, back to six bikes! Try Googling before asking a damn silly question. chateau dot murray at idnet dot com
From: J. Clarke on 17 Jul 2010 09:13 On 7/17/2010 8:36 AM, The Older Gentleman wrote: > J. Clarke<jclarke.usenet(a)cox.net> wrote: > >> But the bike division isn't a stand-alone and that's the whole >> point--the bike division has the resources of all of BMW to call on--the >> test tracks and the supercomputers and the research labs and the wind >> tunnels and the bank accounts and the whole nine yards. > > Yes. I'd be surprised if the coporate accounting doesn't rquire the bike > division to 'pay' for them, though, in the sense that "Three hours in > the wind tunnel means umpteen thousand euros off your bottom line." > > Other companies do it that way. Dunno about BMW. Which doesn't matter--BMW _has_ those resources available. Does Harley? And you can bet that any division of BMW gets priority and discounted pricing on access compared to Harley having to pay retail and stand in line behind the in-house priorities at whatever tunnel they can find to buy time on, if they even bother with such things. >> And if their >> motorcycle sales falter, management can choose to prop them up with >> money from the other parts of the business while they develop and >> implement a corrective strategy. Harley doesn't have that--if V-twin >> cruisers and touring bikes stop selling Harley's _dead_. > > Agreed. > >
From: tomorrow on 17 Jul 2010 10:35 On Jul 17, 8:11 am, "J. Clarke" <jclarke.use...(a)cox.net> wrote: > On 7/16/2010 8:45 PM, tomor...(a)erols.com wrote: > > > > > > > On Jul 16, 7:40 pm, "J. Clarke"<jclarke.use...(a)cox.net> wrote: > >> On 7/16/2010 2:35 PM, tomor...(a)erols.com wrote: > > >>> On Jul 16, 2:18 pm, totallydeadmail...(a)yahoo.co.uk (The Older > >>> Gentleman) wrote: > >>>> tomor...(a)erols.com<tomorrowaterolsdot...(a)yahoo.com> wrote: > >>>>>> HD *is* a small volume producer, really, and yes, BMW, Ducati and > >>>>>> Triumph are even smaller. Moto Guzzi smaller still It's impossible to > >>>>>> argue otherwise. > > >>>>> How do you define "small volume producer," then? > > >>>>> Anyone who doesn't produce millions of scooters and mopeds? > > >>>> I think anything over half a million units counts as volume in today's > >>>> world, but ultimately it's pointless trying to establish a yardstick.. > > >>>> Millions of scooters and mopeds certainly count - why shouldn't they? > > >>> Because in general, when motorcycle enthusists think about > >>> motorcycles, they don't think about mopeds and scooters. And thus > >>> Harley, with 40+% of the current total U.S. streetbike market, > > >> Not even Harley claims 40 percent. > > > Doesn't mean it isn't true. Are you claiming it isn't true? Then > > which of the sales numbers that I have cited from Harley, BMW, and the > > Motorcycle Industry Council (which all agree, btw) is incorrect? > > Please provide a link to the post, I haven't seen it. Yesterday: "Total U.S. on-highway motorcycle sales for 2009 were 357,691 as reported by the Motorcycle Industry Council, and Harley sold 144,464 bikes in the U.S., for a total of 40.4% of on-highway motorcycles, _including_ lightweight (50cc and up) bikes."
From: S'mee on 17 Jul 2010 10:42 On Jul 17, 6:17 am, "J. Clarke" <jclarke.use...(a)cox.net> wrote: > On 7/17/2010 3:56 AM, The Older Gentleman wrote: > > > J. Clarke<jclarke.use...(a)cox.net> wrote: > > >> BMW is ten times the size of Harley. > > > In fairness, if one counts the bike division as a stand-alone, it isn't.. > > But the bike division isn't a stand-alone and that's the whole > point--the bike division has the resources of all of BMW to call on--the > test tracks and the supercomputers and the research labs and the wind > tunnels and the bank accounts and the whole nine yards. And if their > motorcycle sales falter, management can choose to prop them up with > money from the other parts of the business while they develop and > implement a corrective strategy. Harley doesn't have that--if V-twin > cruisers and touring bikes stop selling Harley's _dead_. Actually it is. Just like Chevrolet is a stand alone from GM. Nice try though.
From: Bob Myers on 17 Jul 2010 11:14
J. Clarke wrote: >> BMW motorcycles? Or BMW the corporation? We are not talking about >> cars here in rec.motorcycles. Or maybe, you are. If so, you are >> talking to yourself. > > BMW is BMW and it's ten times the size of Harley no matter how many > motorcycles it sells. When you're talking about a company in the context of a particular product line, you have to look at it both ways - but looking at that particular product line as if it were an independent entity is often the more useful. Being part of a larger corporation can be a good thing from the standpoint of having a built-in "investor" with deep pockets - but if you're not the majority share of that company's revenues, it can also mean that your very existence is at the whim of those "corporate fathers." So you really need to pay attention to the health and position of just that piece of the company, separate from the whole, and relative to how it's doing both with respect to the whole and with respect to the competition in its particular market. Bob M. |