Best Buy drops Brammo

[DaveAK]

It always seemed a strange setup to me, not that I experienced it first hand. I see no reason that a Best Buy employee couldn't be as knowledgeable about a Brammo as they could about a Maytag washer or Samsung TV but it's a different buying experience when you're purchasing a vehicle. I would have thought there's more to a Brammo than just a functional product with a list of features to rattle off. If you go to a bike dealership you'll have a salesman who's got 20+ years enthusiastic riding experience, which is a lot more intersting than 20 years experience watching TV.

[Brutus]

This is good news, Brammo needs to be more oriented in the motorcycle world. From the start I could never get past the fact some 19 year old with little knowledge of motorcycles or riding experience would be the face of Brammo at the point of purchase. This is just a guess but I would expect to hear Brammo and Polaris making some announcements in the coming weeks and that would be more welcome news.

[billmi]

Exactly. Sounds to me like they are paring down to just stocking what is selling in enough volume to meet their needs, and stocking it only in the locations where it sells, when it sells.

[teddillard]

... I would expect to hear Brammo and Polaris making some announcements in the coming weeks and that would be more welcome news.

THAT would be interesting... considering Mark Blackwell (V.P. of Motorcycles at Polaris ) just joined the Board at Zero.
http://www.asphaltandrubber.com/oped...-of-directors/

[cycleguy]

This points to a much larger and more general problem in the market right now. There is simply not enough demand for EV's right now to sustain any business model that relies on volume to be profitable. I'm sure Best Buy would have stuck it out and worked on improving their shortcomings if they were making enough money on EV sales, and saw that there was enough demand to continue the effort.

Unfortunately, this so called economic recovery is not benefiting the every day middle class working person that walks into a Best Buy, or any other motorcycle shop for that matter. EV's are effected even more, since they don't offer nearly the same value as a gas engined counterpart.
I find it interesting that the increase in gas prices are driving higher scooter sales, but not EV sales. In tough times like these, customers are looking to save money, and purchase things that offer them the most value. Purchasing a scooter for $1800 that gets 100MPG, and can be filled up in 2 minutes at a gas station, offers them a greater value than an electric scooter that costs at least twice as much an is much less convenient.
EV's will catch on eventually, but only if the consumer is willing to pay a premium for them, and right now, nobody is.
The Best Buy experiment was interesting, in that it showed how low the demand actually is for Electric motorcycles in the current market. I don't think it has anything to do with the Best Buy sales environment vs. a Motorcycle dealership, you can make a similar comparison to Toys R us and WallMart selling bicycles vs. a real bicycle shop, The big box stores sell a whole bunch more.

I think selling Brammo's through Best Buy was the best way to expose the bike to the general public. Sears sold huge numbers of Austrian made Puchs, re-badged as Allstates in the late 60's, much more than they would have sold through a traditional dealer network. I think the EV has not yet reached the point where the mainstream buyer see's enough value in them to buy one.

[Brutus]

THAT would be interesting... considering Mark Blackwell (V.P. of Motorcycles at Polaris ) just joined the Board at Zero.
http://www.asphaltandrubber.com/oped...-of-directors/

scrambled brain, not Polaris Harley Davidson

[DaveAK]

Are there any independant motorcycle dealership chains? I know a couple of Anchorage shops sell more than one brand, but they're not exactly nationwide chains. The shops around here are all single brand stores, so you'd have to partner with the manufacturer. An independant dealership chain though would be a different proposition.

[billmi]

Around here, and what I saw in Central California, most motorcycle shops tended to be single or two brands. The exception was "House of Power" (known as House of Rip-Off to local riders) that carried 5 or more brands - with a showroom as large as some car dealerships. They started dropping some of their brands, Kawasaki first, a couple of years ago, and went bust a year ago.

[jpanichella]

I guess the worst thing about this is that now Brammo is going to be getting less exposure for everyday people. Any hype is good hype, right?

[moparren]

Right, 'cause that worked out soooo well for Buell. Just ask someone that owns one how they were treated at the Harley store when the wanted to get a Buell. At least with Best Buy you could chase down a 19 year old...

scrambled brain, not Polaris Harley Davidson