For the second year in succession, H-D Europe has canceled its 29th annual European H.O.G. Rally. It had been slated for 10th to 13th June at Portoroi on the Adriatic coast of Slovenia, close to the Italian and Croat borders. An international highlight of the international H.O.G. calendar, the Rally regularly attracts riders from more than 60 countries.
Pied Piper has reported Harley dealers as ranked #1 in 2021 for responding to website customers. The Indian Motorcycle brand was ranked second, followed by BMW and Polaris. Dealers for top brands were found to have improved their website response behaviors dramatically over the past two years, while dealers for other brands failed to improve. The 2021 internet lead effectiveness (ILE) study results show that dealers selling Harley, Indian, BMW or Polaris sent an email or text answering a website customer's question about 50% of the time on average - in 2019, the figure for the same dealers was only about 35% of the time. In contrast, Honda, Kawasaki, Triumph or Yamaha dealers sent an email or text answering a website customer's question only about 30% of the time.
The Custom Bike Show, an AMD World Championship of Custom Bike Building Official Affiliate planned for the Motorama Expo in Madrid, Spain in June has had to be postponed for 2021. It had been slated for the first weekend of June, and while the pandemic is largely under control in Spain, with the Madrid City authorities issuing a permit for Motorama itself to go ahead, organizer Expo Motor Events has had to conclude that time was too short to be able to prepare the custom show to the required international standard. It is hoped that it will go ahead in its usual annual slot in March 2022 instead.
Vancouver, Canada based Damon Motors has received an "Honorable Mention" accolade in the Transportation category of the 2021 Fast Company World Changing Idea Awards. The recognition is for its HyperSport superbike, which Damon describes as "the world's smartest, safest, most powerful, fully connected electric motorcycle." The awards honor the businesses, policies, projects and concepts that are actively engaged and deeply committed to pursuing innovation when it comes to solving health and climate crises, social injustice or economic inequality; www.damon.com
Although Cycle World has been reduced to, basically, being a click bait tool for an online loan shark (aka a 'FinTech' start-up), the brand name still carries some residual cache. So, when Cycle World passed judgement on the Pan America, it is still worth taking notice of. Its verdict? "It's legit." In fact, not only does Justin Dawes think Harley has "pulled it off" and built a legitimate adventure-touring motorcycle," but that the Pan America 1250 Special "is the best motorcycle The Motor Company has ever produced." There you have it! It may not be "game over, move over" for BMW yet, but Harley is "in the game." Cool!
After releasing 'The Exhaust' for Euro 5 Fat Bob models, Dutch noise management exhaust specialist Dr Jekill & Mr Hyde is also now shipping 'The Exhaust' for Euro 5 Touring 107/114 inch models and the CVO 117 inchers.
Piaggio saw Q1 two-wheeler sales grow by +35% over Q1 2020 and +22% from Q1 2019, with highest Q1 consolidated net sales revenue since 2007 and "best ever" Q1 EBITDA and net profit. Piaggio reduced debt by € 100m and sold a total of 135,000 vehicles of all kinds worldwide in Q1 (+15.3% from 117,100 in Q1 2019). In two-wheeler terms (Piaggio, Vespa, Moto Guzzi, Aprilia etc), the Group sold 103,200 two-wheelers worldwide (+35% from 76,400 in Q1 2020), generating net sales of € 296.9m/+42.2%. Sales were +90% in India and America, +47.2% in Asia Pacific and +70% in Italy.
Sources: AMD, IDN, FT, Reuters, PSB, MPN, BDN, MCN, AP, Bloomberg, MSNW, Electrek, electricmotorcycles.news, RideApart.com, Motor1.com, Cycle World, motorbikewriter.com
