Riders of Bridgwater

[rocking rooster]

Was told earlier today that Riders of Bridgwater are losing their Harley franchise in the new year. My source doesn't know if the same applies to Riders at Bristol or not.
If they do go, where can I buy my Christmas tree baubles and dog waistcoats? . I guess it will have to be Cheltenham or Southampton.

 

[Rick]

Let's hope this is not true, a long standing H-D dealer and home of the first HOG Chapter.

 

[Mark Hammond]

Was told earlier today that Riders of Bridgwater are losing their Harley franchise in the new year. My source doesn't know if the same applies to Riders at Bristol or not.
If they do go, where can I buy my Christmas tree baubles and dog waistcoats? . I guess it will have to be Cheltenham or Southampton.

I’ve heard the same about Riders Bridgewater.

 

[SJC69]

That will be bad news, Riders being the second longest H-D official dealer after Warrs, not sure when the became a franchised dealer but only one of two still from this '91 list.

 

[SJC69]

Let's hope this is not true, a long standing H-D dealer and home of the first HOG Chapter.

I'm not certain on this but I thought it was Motex and the Rolling Hills chapter that was the first UK/Europe one!

 

[watchman]

Cant wait for januarys list looks like the dealer world is changeing

 

[Mark Hammond]

I'm not certain on this but I thought it was Motex and the Rolling Hills chapter that was the first UK/Europe one!

Yep, Rolling Hills was the first UK HOG Chapter, followed by Bridgewater. Bridgewater claim to be the longest continuous running chapter in Europe due to Rolling Hills having had a number of different sponsoring dealerships.

In an organisation where the number of badges on someone’s jacket and the number of years someone has been a member probably determine a persons value to the organisation, details such as how long a particular dealer has sponsored a chapter are probably life or death matters.

Presumably the Bridgewater chapter will now go independent, merge with Great Western or fold.

I had a long chat with Cheltenham HD a few weeks ago and its fair to say they aren’t particularly enamoured with the Rolling Hills chapter and in their own words “we don’t get a choice as to whether we support a HOG chapter, and we rarely see them here in the dealership”

The Riders Bridgewater showroom is a big building just to sell Ducati’s from, so I guess they’ll be looking for other brands to sell alongside Ducati or maybe they’ll consolidate into one showroom at the Bristol premises.

 

[michael_dinwiddy]

The late Dave Holden is related to me, he ran the Bridgwater Chapter of HOG for many years. Was fully time paid up to do various jobs flying all over the world. Im sure he would be upset at the news.

Personally I find most of the Franchisees totally uninterested in customer service and quite insincere. I hope that Harley Davidson put something better in their place.

If I need parts I go to a Harley Specialist in Bridgwater. No Christmas baubles there im afraid but always has good oil in stock

 

[SJC69]

Appearing to be the ‘Harbinger of Doom’, this is looking to the wheel turning full circle again and has all the hallmarks of the previous H-D vision which lead to quite a few of that ’91 Dealer list above eventually ceasing to be franchised dealers.

It smacks of ‘You do not meet our corporate vision and standard of a dealership, so either spend a fortune on a new showroom, upgrading. etc or no-longer have a franchise’.

H-D have pursued a vision in the US of large corporate style dealerships and pushed out a lot of small independents.
It could well be corporate suicide for any dealership to massively invest in a new look dealership, workshop showroom etc. at this time, also when considering the life of the suppling new combustion engine vehicle may well be limited!

Somehow I can’t see ‘anyone’ queuing up to invest massively in opening up a new dealership and bear in mind H-Ds policy of deleting older spares & parts any that do are not going to invest in stock, tools and skills for older deleted models, bear in mind the newest Evolution is now 25 years old and the newest Twin Cam 6 years!

 

[SJC69]

I had a long chat with Cheltenham HD a few weeks ago and its fair to say they aren’t particularly enamoured with the Rolling Hills chapter and in their own words “we don’t get a choice as to whether we support a HOG chapter, and we rarely see them here in the dealership”

The Dealership has total say in how and who runs a Chapter, it's in the HOG Charter that can be found on line, that why I have always said HOG in not a Club, well a true democratic club, the members can always be overruled by the Dealership & HOG.
Several Chapters have been shut down and re-started because the Dealership did not like how they were run!

 

[Mark Hammond]

The Dealership has total say in how and who runs a Chapter, it's in the HOG Charter that can be found on line, that why I have always said HOG in not a Club, well a true democratic club, the members can always be overruled by the Dealership & HOG.
Several Chapters have been shut down and re-started because the Dealership did not like how they were run!

Yeah, I think they were saying that, given a choice they currently wouldn’t support a HOG chapter, but the corporate directive says they have to sponsor a HOG chapter. The conversation was being had in the context of trying to negotiate some potential support and discounts for local HDRC regions and members, and how the dealership would manage any push back from their HOG chapter.

 

[michael_dinwiddy]

Bit longwinded and dull but a recent vid.

 

[Rick]

Let's hope this is not true, a long standing H-D dealer and home of the first HOG Chapter.

There is a large HOG plaque mounted on the wall at Bridgwater claiming historic status - exact wording I can't remember, but appreciate the clarification from Mark.

In my mind H-D as a company sadly are on a downward spiral in the UK for the following reasons:
1. On going economic squeaze.
2. H-D being very expensive and therefore increasingly out of reach of the average motorcyclist.
3. No affordable or available small capacity offering.
4. No lightweight small capacity scrambler - currently in vogue.
5. Ludicrously expensive accessories and riding gear.
6. No appetite by motorcyclists to change over to electric - Live Wire has been an expensive failure.
7. The push to seriously break in to the large capacity adventure bike market has not been successful in UK.
8. The iconic air cooled Sportster replacement offerings has also not been well received.
9. Asian components and assemblies are noticeably inferior - whilst cost to purchase remains high.
10. The demise of the combustion engine planned by UK/Europe.
11. Availability of parts and the long wait for them.
12. Outlets are closing and therefore the marques presence at a regional level is diminishing.

I take no pleasure listing my observations, I am an enthusiast of the big v twin American icon. I am proud to be part of this historic club of ours and enjoy the many friendships formed from within the membership. None of this would be possible had I been riding anything else. But you can see the appeal of the successful retro revolution, where many mature in age riders are gravitating towards low capacity / affordable offerings from the likes of Royal Enfield. Having fun on two wheels should not mean impoverishing yourself, and in times of an endless economic crisis luxuries are the first to be cut back and that sadly impacts on expensive bikes.

I hope Riders of Bridgwater continues to sell Ducati's and perhaps replace H-D with something like Moto Guzzi, another iconic marque which would compliment the existing iconic Italian brand. We will watch with interest how this unfolds.

 

[Mark Hammond]

This article published in August provides some insight into the possible underlying financial reasons that may be driving both franchisees and the MoCo towards a rationalisation of the dealer network as they look towards an immediate future of potentially lower volumes of sales and harder trading conditions than they have experienced in the recent past. Some dealer principles may simply be taking the opportunity to sever ties with HD before they themselves end up in a difficult financial position, caused by diminishing sales, reduced income from credit agreement sales, and limited product and parts availability from the mothership.

From the attached article

“The full grievous tale of Q2 began with a 1.6% total revenue shortfall to £1.135bn. Turnover from motorcycles and related products fell by 4.5% to £941.3m, with associated operating profit 7.9% down to £152.7m. LiveWire revenue took a 43.8% dive to an almost token £5.5m, the brand booking a quarterly operating loss of £25.1m. And although HDFS enjoyed an 18.6% revenue increase to £189.1m, its operating profit plummeted by 31.4% to £46.4m. Combined operating profit across all business sectors was 20.3% in arrears on £174.1m. Quarterly net profit deteriorated by 17.5% to £140m.

Perhaps oddly, Q2 global retail Harley motorcycle sales were positive, 2.6% up to 51,526 units. Key US domestic deliveries also prospered by 1.6% to 32,161, although the EMEA region and Canada were on the back foot.

A telling factor was the reduction in Q2 wholesale shipments, 10.4% down worldwide to 42,934 units and the US domestic portion of those falling by 14% to 24,229. An enforced shutdown of Harley’s biggest assembly plant at York in Pennsylvania for several weeks in June, owing to recurrent parts shortages, bore an indeterminate degree of responsibility. Losing nearly a month’s production will inevitably also impact on Q3 peak-season product availability.”

HARLEY-DAVIDSON: LITTLE TO CELEBRATE | British Dealer News

britishdealernews.co.uk

 

[watchman]

“I find most of the Franchisees totally uninterested in customer service and quite insincere. I hope that Harley Davidson put something better in their place.”

Good point sounds like they need……
HDRCGB

 

[Dazzlin]

Probably down to breech of contract and no doubt similar to Jersey Harley's departure with HD sadly.

HD will not allow other marques of bikes to be sold in the same building. Riders Motorcycles (who also own Riders of Bridgewater) have a dedicated Harley Building in Bristol, but the Bridgewater outlet has all marques of bikes under the same roof.

Sounds like they will loose the Harley element from Bridgewater, but Bristol is aligned with Corporate/Contractual requirements of the Franchise Agreement so I hope this remains, unless of course Riders re-locate their Harley element in Bridgewater to a new building.

Sad but probably true.

 

[Rick]

In an economic crisis with high inflation and cost of borrowing, who is going to start up a new H-D outlet and commit millions to conform to a BS corporate template? It will take many years to break even on that huge investment, all the while the demise of the combustion engine is being planned by our politicians.

Let's be very clear - the majority of us believe the heart and soul of any motorcycle (in particular H-D) is it's power plant and that is a combustible engine not a lithium battery!

The big bike luxury market will shrink, those of us that have enjoyed the golden years of motorcycling will be gone in a decade or two. The party my friends is nearly over - the future for biking will resemble nothing like that for which we've enjoyed. I will never ride a soulless battery operated fire-ball, that's my choice.

So let's enjoy what we have and make the most of the time we have left with our beloved V twin engine propelled Hogs!

 

[Mark Hammond]

Probably down to breech of contract and no doubt similar to Jersey Harley's departure with HD sadly.

HD will not allow other marques of bikes to be sold in the same building. Riders Motorcycles (who also own Riders of Bridgewater) have a dedicated Harley Building in Bristol, but the Bridgewater outlet has all marques of bikes under the same roof.

Sounds like they will loose the Harley element from Bridgewater, but Bristol is aligned with Corporate/Contractual requirements of the Franchise Agreement so I hope this remains, unless of course Riders re-locate their Harley element in Bridgewater to a new building.

Sad but probably true.

The Bristol showroom has been selling new Ducati stock as well as HD for sometime now. I do wonder whether this is a business decision on the part of the owners of Riders to consolidate their HD presence into one location and possibly move all Ducati sales into Bridgewater or maybe give up the Bridgewater location altogether.

 

[Andy from Sandy]

10. The demise of the combustion engine planned by UK/Europe.

I ride with Alf, who you would have seen at the Shovel meet you guys did, and the dirty half dozen on machines that are 40 to 50 years old. They have no intention of going new so until petrol is unavailable to run them you will see them about for years to come.

 

[michael_dinwiddy]

Im not sure I agree with the 'golden years' of motorcycling have been and gone. Motorcycle engineering has moved on, not gone. Modern bikes have a greater electrical input; complexities of valve timing, ignition, injection abs traction control, suspension adjustment, etc can now be altered on the move to satisfy the rider requirements of the moment, be it motorway or off-road. The hybrid is already here and Harley are moving in the same direction. The Harley Revolution engine is a highly complex piece of modern engineering. And with this evolution of the motorcycle comes the new motorcyclist, less cruiser vest wearing pastiché of the 'biker MC' to more of an individual adventurer who are most often independent than Club types. I am only guessing, but would think that the 'old style Dealer' is also becoming obsolete, and Harley have a new vision of what is more cost effective and in line with future trends. There are almost as many adventure bikes in the Sunday carpark hang outs as there are race and cruiser models, and if Harley Davidson don't move with the times they will become obsolete too.