While the US motorcycle market posted a 36% decline last month compared to a year ago, BMW was busy posting up some impressive numbers. The German company is reporting its February 2010 sales numbers are up 52% compared to February 2009. The main reason for the surge: the 2010 BMW S1000RR superbike, which would make BMW’s gamble of competing head-to-head with the Japanese Four a venerable victory. More after the jump.
Even though the 2009 MotoGP season isn’t over yet, that hasn’t stopped the folks at Laguna Seca from opening up ticket sales for the 2010 races. While Laguna Seca may not host AMA racing this year, it will get the chance to host the all-American and all-Texan crew of Ben Spies and Colin Edwards.
Honda has released its second quarter financials, with the highlight (if you can call it that) being a 56.2% drop in their net income. Honda attributes this loss primarily to decreased car sales, and the currency exchange. For its part though, Honda’s motorcycle sales were down only 16.8%, with 2.4 million units sold during Q2.
Zero Motorcycles has announced its launch of a fleet sales program aimed at corporations, non-profits, government bodies, and small business owners who are looking to make multiple unit purchases. The program is set to launch November 2nd, with pricing being based on volume and support requirements. It’s hard to make B2B sales sound sexy, but consider the missed opportunity that was Erik Estrada on a Zero DS…if only we could turn back time.
There’s a large stigma around China and the motorcycle industry, but Ducati isn’t one to let some misconceptions get in the way of their bottomline. With China rapidly becoming one of the largest motorcycle markets in the world, Ducati has its eyes set on establishing itself as the premium brand of choice for uppity Chinese urbanites, and thus has opened its first Official Ducati store in China this week. More after the jump.
The latest data from the Motorcycle Industry Council (MIC), suggests that the end of cascading motorcycle sales may be near. According to the MIC, the combined new unit sales for motorcycles, scooters, and ATVS during the past 9 months were down 40% from last year’s numbers. While still frighteningly low, these results show a 2% rebound in sales when compared to the first 6 months of 2009.
Brammo has hit the sales floors of Best Buy with their electric motorcycle the Enertia. Debuting in the Portland Oregon area, instead of the previously rumored San Francisco/Bay Area, you can expect to see the green machine trickle its way down the west coast throughout the year’s time.
Right now, Brammo has their TTR race bike from the TTXGP on display at the Cascade Station Best Buy in Portland. Videos and pictures after the jump.
Because of the changes in the economy, Austrian based KTM has had to readjust their sales forecasts for the X-Bow track car/go-kart on steroids, resulting in KTM halting current production of the X-Bow until 2010.
According to the latest polls conducted by PowerSports Business, the cruiser segment of motorcycle sales have been hit the hardest during the current economic meltdown, seeing nearly a 31% drop over last year’s numbers. Following close behind are dual-sport sales, which were reported to be down 29%. Touring bikes have fared better than the rest of the industry, showing only an 9% drop in sales figures.
No numbers were released for the sportbike segment, but these numbers do seem to be better a better outcome than what was being reported by the metric manufacturers earlier this month. Without more data, it’s hard to say who/where the most pain is being felt in the industry, but there clearly are brands and segments that seem to be more insularly to the fluctuations in our economic condition.
Source: PowerSports Business
It’s doom and gloom today. The motorcycle industry continues to be slogged on the nose like a near-sighted proctologist, as exports from metric manufacturers declined by 65% this June from 2008’s figures. This drop comes after May only showed a 58% loss over last year’s numbers, showing an escalation of the problems for the motorcycle industry, instead of the beginnings of an abatement. For those who aren’t keeping score, 2009 so far has sold 25% less units than 2008, with the crunch hitting the hardest as sales normally would pick up during the summer.
At the end of last year, we announced where if you bought a Sportster motorcycle (sadly, not the XR1200), you could receive the MSRP value of the bike if you traded it in the following year for “bigger” model.
The promotion was such a great success apparently, that now that it has ended, Harley-Davidson sales have slumped off.