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[Phreakyz]

According to this, they are making some changes to streamline production.  All touring except the standards will have Trac Control,  GTS will come Std on Touring, FXDR Discontinued,  and more...
PLUS NO MORE CVOs WILL BE PRODUCED FOR 2020 so dealer inventory is all you will see until Jan/Feb 2021.

[Phreakyz]

I'm not sure that I am reading this correctly but it looks like they may have also discontinued Billiard Blue from the touring (Non CVO) lineup?   I thought that color was pretty cool...

[iski]

Changeover time, and with a bad sales period in Spring there are enough - probably more than enough - 2020s already out there.  2021 will bring more changes no doubt, will be interesting to see the CVOs (I hope).

[2smoke]

It seems that this video has been scrubbed from YouTube. Can't find it.

[Robmay]

Says it’s private.


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[Phreakyz]

Looks like he has taken it down for some reason.   It was from Matt Laidlaw,  I follow him on YouTube.   Maybe it was inaccurate or something??  I guess we will see if he puts it back up.   https://www.youtube.com/user/zeallistic/videos

[FLSTFI Dave]

Changeover time, and with a bad sales period in Spring there are enough - probably more than enough - 2020s already out there.  2021 will bring more changes no doubt, will be interesting to see the CVOs (I hope).

Really depends on area.  Local dealer will be out of new bikes to sell before memorial day weekend.  What is he suppose to sell to keep his doors open and pay the bills if he has no 2020 bikes to sell for the end of May though the new year?

[mark]

Really depends on area.  Local dealer will be out of new bikes to sell before memorial day weekend.  What is he suppose to sell to keep his doors open and pay the bills if he has no 2020 bikes to sell for the end of May though the new year?

I don’t know...maybe reassign bikes from dealers that are overstocked to more successful stores?  There’s probably some dealers that would like a smaller inventory.

[Robmay]

I don’t know...maybe reassign bikes from dealers that are overstocked to more successful stores?  There’s probably some dealers that would like a smaller inventory.

If indeed it comes down to running out of bikes I agree with Mark that they will move bikes from less
productive dealers.


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[iski]

I don’t know...maybe reassign bikes from dealers that are overstocked to more successful stores?  There’s probably some dealers that would like a smaller inventory.

x2.  Re-align inventories plus it appears there will be more HD dealers closing which will mean more bikes.

[Cat Eye]

Is Harley production still shut down?

[mjb765]

no CVO's until Jan 2021??  So nothing in Aug/Sept like always?

[Phreakyz]

no CVO's until Jan 2021??  So nothing in Aug/Sept like always?

The new CEO has decided that they will introduce the '21s in Jan/Feb as opposed to Aug/Sep like they have in the past.   He thinks that introducing them towards the beginning of the riding season will be better than rolling them out towards the end.

[Twolanerider]

The new CEO has decided that they will introduce the '21s in Jan/Feb as opposed to Aug/Sep like they have in the past.   He thinks that introducing them towards the beginning of the riding season will be better than rolling them out towards the end.

The things that make us laugh.  Here's a story:

Long time ago and moderately far away.  On a really well used and rarely cleaned 1987-? FXRT pulled in to a little greasy spoon in Holbrook, Nebraska.  Coming in from west across the plains were clouds that spoke loudly saying "don't ride this way son."  So I didn't.  Greasy spoon was refuge. 

I wasn't inside more than five minutes before the wind picked up and the thunder started shaking the place.  Coming in from the west just ahead of the Travel Gods' Band in the Sky came some guy even dustier than me on an FL.  He knew he wasn't going to outrun the storm so he was stopping too.  Holbrook (at least then) had, maybe, 1500 people.  If you wiped a bug out of your eye you missed it so we were both lucky to slide in to the place when we did.

Both sat down and, of course, started talking about motorcycles.  This, of course, meant Harleys.  The topic, and the only time I ever remember talking about it, was why didn't Harley release new year model bikes at the beginning of a riding season when people would be most interested?  It made sense then too.

[VaEagle]

I guess it's all a matter of timing and tradition...look at the car/truck market they always release the new vehicles in late summer/early fall. I never understood how you can call something a 2021 model when it was designed built and sold in 2020...
Considering many owners change parts and do mods to make the bike their own I wonder how smart it is to introduce new year models at a time when shops are busy prepping bikes for riding season and factories were shut down for Christmas and New Years?
Not to mention that many customers will be broke from holiday gifts and trips and worried about tax time in April?

[mark]

The new CEO has decided that they will introduce the '21s in Jan/Feb as opposed to Aug/Sep like they have in the past.   He thinks that introducing them towards the beginning of the riding season will be better than rolling them out towards the end.

So, if other manufacturers stick with the tradition of releasing new models in Aug-Sept, won’t that give Indian, BMW, Honda, etc., a jump start on the new model year?  Who in a cold weather area would buy a bike in Jan, knowing it’ll be 3-4 months before they can ride it?  I’d wait until things warmed up...it’s not like HD is going to run out of bikes.  Also, if this is a one time thing, that means the ‘21 model year will only be 8-9 months.

[FLSTFI Dave]

If indeed it comes down to running out of bikes I agree with Mark that they will move bikes from less
productive dealers.


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This would be the answer, but the MoCo would have to be involved and directing it.  The smaller dealers with poor sales and excess inventory is going to want to make money on their inventory.  The successful dealer is not going to want to pay the dealer with poor sales more for the bike than they would pay the MoCo.  Unless its just a shift of inventory with no profit for the unsuccessful dealer, it would reward the unsuccessful dealer which is not right in my mind.  It would also punish the successful dealer.

[mark]

This would be the answer, but the MoCo would have to be involved and directing it.  The smaller dealers with poor sales and excess inventory is going to want to make money on their inventory.  The successful dealer is not going to want to pay the dealer with poor sales more for the bike than they would pay the MoCo.  Unless its just a shift of inventory with no profit for the unsuccessful dealer, it would reward the unsuccessful dealer which is not right in my mind.  It would also punish the successful dealer.

Agreed.  For this to work, it would have to be orchestrated by the MoCo, with them eating the transportation cost, etc.  I’d think a dealership that’s struggling would want to lighten their inventory...no use in paying for excess bikes sitting on the showroom floor that aren’t selling.

[WildClyde]

The announcement model that worked for me was to announce the next year's models right before Sturgis, and to bring the H-D dog-and-pony show to the Rapid City Convention Center for all to see. Demos, every model in every color, reps from Engineering, reps from Manufacturing, reps from Marketing, were all present. The place was packed!

There was a rider herd mentality present that made considering purchasing the latest-next-new-thing bike exciting. It worked for me! Within a few days of reaching home, I went into my dealer and ordered a new CVO.

[BigLew55]

The announcement model that worked for me was to announce the next year's models right before Sturgis, and to bring the H-D dog-and-pony show to the Rapid City Convention Center for all to see. Demos, every model in every color, reps from Engineering, reps from Manufacturing, reps from Marketing, were all present. The place was packed!

There was a rider herd mentality present that made considering purchasing the latest-next-new-thing bike exciting. It worked for me! Within a few days of reaching home, I went into my dealer and ordered a new CVO.

I definitely miss riding the new and shiny stuff at Sturgis.  Now that they are all last year's models, I don't bother.  It would be nice to get back to that.  Maybe they'll do it at Daytona now?  That wasn't nearly as enjoyable an event as is the Black Hills Classic....
 

[Threephase]

So My take away from all this Is that the new Road Glide CVO will be a really low production numbers bike making it very desirable since there will so few of them.

[FLSTFI Dave]

The announcement model that worked for me was to announce the next year's models right before Sturgis, and to bring the H-D dog-and-pony show to the Rapid City Convention Center for all to see. Demos, every model in every color, reps from Engineering, reps from Manufacturing, reps from Marketing, were all present. The place was packed!

There was a rider herd mentality present that made considering purchasing the latest-next-new-thing bike exciting. It worked for me! Within a few days of reaching home, I went into my dealer and ordered a new CVO.

My wife and I were in the first four non employees to ride the new 15 Rushmore Road glides at the Sturgis unveiling.  She went home traded her street glide and bought her first road glide as soon as the dealer got one. 

[RoadTrip]

Agreed.  For this to work, it would have to be orchestrated by the MoCo, with them eating the transportation cost, etc.  I’d think a dealership that’s struggling would want to lighten their inventory...no use in paying for excess bikes sitting on the showroom floor that aren’t selling.

When dealers receive inventory, it moves from H-D’s ownership to dealers’s ownership, usually financed by the dealer’s floorplan (think interim loan). Dealers have “x” number of months (usually 4-6 months) of no payments on the floorplan loan to allow time to sell. If they hold the inventory too long, they have to start paying down the floorplan loan associated with that bike. This is usually why you see Manager’s Specials listed in the dealership ads.

Unless H-D is foreclosing on a floorplan loan, they cannot simply reallocate inventory once it has been received by a dealer. Any trades between dealers are actually sales at some agreed upon wholesale price. In these cases, the buying dealer doesn’t get credit for the ultimate sale of the bike to the consumer because the bike wasn’t direct delivered by the factory and the selling dealer also gets penalized. This is important because for the last three years, H-D has been allocating inventory based on the dealer’s prior year’s sales of direct delivered bikes. So the small or weak performing dealers are basically dying a slow death or refocusing to pre-owned sales (or New sales of other brands) for survival.

[2smoke]

Is Harley production still shut down?

Engine assembly re-started today- Monday, May, 18th.

[CVODON]

Most of the dealers, both small & large have a supplemental floorplan account with the local bank they do most business with. This allows them to have floating money available for about anything they need it for borrowed basically against the bikes sitting on the showroom floor, this is in addition to the HD Financial money that will be due at some point on unsold units. So for one dealer with large inventory to release bikes to another would have to include first any HD Financial monies owed against the paperwork on a specific bike + the local floorplan money which has been spent in most cases.
Dealer to Dealer could happen, but would not be a simple easy deal and would make receiving dealer have additional funds in these bikes compared to ones straight from HD + His HD Financial and local floorplan money would start to increase so MORE money in these units.
Just a terrible involved idea. UNLESS HD steps up and compensates the holding, or overstocked dealer a credit toward future units, This does happen in the car market, maybe it does in bikes as well.

[grc]

Unless things have changed since I was in the auto business, the moment the dealership takes possession of the new vehicle ownership passes from the manufacturer to the dealer.  At that point, the manufacturer can't just decide to move dealer A's inventory to dealer B.  Any such inventory shuffling would have to be between the dealers involved.  The manufacturer could always decide to set up a program to help pay the dealer giving up inventory, to grease the transaction so to speak, but as long as dealer A isn't out of trust on that inventory Harley can't just confiscate it and move it on their own.  And there is always a problem when a company uses Harley's system for allocating new bikes.  Dealer A is not going to want to give up future allocations based on retail sales, so that would also have to be negotiated.

Jerry

[Robmay]

If I’ve learned anything during these “unusual” times it is that any law, rule or regulation can be changed at any given time by those who deem it “necessary” at a moments notice.


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[Threephase]

I wonder what poor souls will get the first 15-20 engines built after a shutdown? Quality control seems to have been lacking under normal circumstances.

[Grizzly]

Less is more, I guess???

https://www.cnet.com/google-amp/news/harley-davidson-restructure-fewer-models-sales/

[Twolanerider]

Less is more, I guess???

https://www.cnet.com/google-amp/news/harley-davidson-restructure-fewer-models-sales/

Saw that article yesterday.  Had to just shake my head when read how the company's new reliance for success would be to harken back to lower production levels and "exclusivity" to in some way tweak interest. 

I looked it up the word in the just made up American Heritage of Harley Dictionary and found this:

Exclusivity: The act of denying people motorcycles today they have already decided yesterday they do not want anymore.

[charles05663]

Ummm...

I wonder how this fits into the Harley 100 New Models announcement from 2017.

 

[2smoke]

Less is more, I guess???

https://www.cnet.com/google-amp/news/harley-davidson-restructure-fewer-models-sales/

Total fantasy. So what do they do about dealerships loaded with bikes that are selling poorly? The used market is bulging at the seams with bikes. There is NOTHING exclusive about that. In other sectors of the powersports industry I've walked into dealers to see brand new units that were 2, even 3, model years old. They end up being forced to fire sale that old inventory at huge discounts. So consumers can get a killer deal of 70% (or less) of MSRP. Then why buy the current model and spend thousands more? The problem just continues. Harley had their idiotic "surge" period where they just continued to pound out product anticipating someone would buy it. Sales continued to fall and they just kept "surging". Offer a $7,500 rebate on a new bike with 0% financing for 6 years and I might consider buying one. Sound familiar? That's the situation the auto industry found themselves in. The consumer gets used to big incentives and discounts and we want them forever. Supply and demand- the most simple economic principle in the world and still the most misunderstood.

[iski]

Ummm...

I wonder how this fits into the Harley 100 New Models announcement from 2017.

 

Gone With the Wind, like the old CEO.

[newseultra07]

My local dealer is advertising to buy used bikes & pay top dollar. Well I took my 2018 CVO Anniversary Limited just to see what I would get... Drum roll I was offered $25K with 3000 miles on it.. I just laughed and turned and walked out of there.. SO mush for top dollar they want to get there used inventory up when run out of new bikes Im guessing.

[mark]

My local dealer is advertising to buy used bikes & pay top dollar. Well I took my 2018 CVO Anniversary Limited just to see what I would get... Drum roll I was offered $25K with 3000 miles on it.. I just laughed and turned and walked out of there.. SO mush for top dollar they want to get there used inventory up when run out of new bikes Im guessing.

That’s an old car dealer ploy to get you in the dealership...I get those every few months.  If I searched correctly, their “top dollar” offer is about $4k below the KBB trade-in value.

[bbrown]

The announcement model that worked for me was to announce the next year's models right before Sturgis, and to bring the H-D dog-and-pony show to the Rapid City Convention Center for all to see. Demos, every model in every color, reps from Engineering, reps from Manufacturing, reps from Marketing, were all present. The place was packed!

There was a rider herd mentality present that made considering purchasing the latest-next-new-thing bike exciting. It worked for me! Within a few days of reaching home, I went into my dealer and ordered a new CVO.

Yup. Those were the good old days.   Rapid city would be packed at the convention center and a couple times I called my Dealer from there and told him to get me one after seeing the bike live.   My 2004 SEEG  was a prime example.
Now a day you can see the new Indians at their packed display in Sturgis, and see last years models at the Harley tent and get a hair cut...geez

[Robmay]

Interesting video.





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[FLSTFI Dave]

Very interesting video Rob.

[bbrown]

Great video but depressing.
   Sure wish it was back to the late 90’s and early 2000’s