| Author | Message | ||
     Rsh |
Not much of a EBR dealer network in Colorado. There are the same amount of EBR dealers as are there are Tesla service centers....One. I believe the online sales approach is something that should be tried. Some of the auto manufactures besides Tesla are trying it. The millennials are starting to force it, they do not want to go into a dealer to haggle price as it can be very confrontational as well as taking hours of time. In the past reading this board about all the supposedly incompetent dealers in regard to sales and service of Buell's, the EBR dealers were better, but the business didn't last long enough to see any possibility of growth. | ||
| Milar |
By using a "direct to consumer" distribution model you open up additional revenue streams. Some are very very profitable. Financing: Dealer profit on financing can exceed the profit on the sale. In consumer direct sales this profit goes to Buell. Extended Warranties: Not for everyone. But an additional revenue stream to Buell. One last advantage is control. Buell controls the sales force. They control the message. A well trained, professional sales force, even on the internet/telephone is preferable to a poor salesman who dislikes the product at a pissed off dealer who wants to steer the customer to a more profitable brand. Mike | ||
| Court |
Uhhhhhhh......don't forget. We'll need a motorcycle first. | ||
| Davegess |
Lot of interesting ideas floating about. An Court is right, they'd a bike. The primary thing to remember here is that money has to be very tight. All the cool marketing stuff costs money, Certifying a new manufacture cost money. Spare parts distribution costs money. This new company is going be all about where to put very scarce resources. I think it is going to be a very tough road. I don't envy the work ahead. | ||
| 46champ |
Buell controls the sales force. They control the message. I think that was a major part of the problem there was no message. | ||
| _lightshow |
How can " money be very tight" when " deep pockets" have been awarded the EBR assets by a State Court? Perhaps there's more here that might be looked into by a Federal Bankruptcy Judge? | ||
| Davegess |
One has to define "deep pockets" he may be pretty rich but I don't think Bruce has a spare $100 million to invest. I could be wrong about this of course. You have to remember that he was the only bidder on this | ||
| Court |
If someone can't bring $50M to the party ...its gonna be a tough go. $2M will last about 5 weeks. | ||
| _lightshow |
The North Star can fund this, as long as a "flip" isn't part of the deal. | ||
| Rex |
Anyone been reading about Royal Enfield. They hired the overseas sales person from Harley Davidson. They are setting up their new USA offices in Wisconsin. They now have a design firm in England, which designed their new cafe racer and frame. Harris I believe. The CEO is going to move to England and live there for a year, as they develop a couple of new platforms. The milwaukee offices are going to have company owned stores, in addition to dealers. It was an interesting read. They also hired Terablanche from Ducati to help with design work. As Court says, it takes a lot of money. even 100,000,000 million is not enough now to keep a plant up and running. Sales are keys. I think there are a lot of buell faithful out there, | ||
| Hughlysses |
even 100,000,000 million is not enough now to keep a plant up and running 100 trillion dollars is an ass of money. I'm pretty sure you could keep a motorcycle company running for a LONG time with that. (I think you got carried away when you added "million" to all the zeros.) | ||
| Rex |
100,000,000 million... | ||
| Rex |
1 hundred million.......excelsior burned thru that fairly quick......so did mv agusta....and others.....brammo sold to polaris..... watch out for victory. they want to be known as a performance brand, now that indian has the cruiser part wrapped up.. | ||
| Hughlysses |
Yes, 100 million. 100,000,000 million is 100,000,000,000,000 which is 100 trillion. I think we could all get a few free EBR's for that much money.  (Message edited by Hughlysses on October 05, 2015) | ||
| Buelliedan |
With the news that Dave and Court reported that they are not going to be able to sell the 350 bikes currently in the warehouse I am very pessimistic that EBR is ever going to be a viable company again. | ||
| Court |
I think we all knew what Rex meant. Fact is . . . somewhere on the $100M order of magnitude would not be a stretch to launch something akin to what we are expecting from EBR. $100M would support things like design, testing, production, establishing and maintaining a dealer network proper internet/social media presence, marketing, customer liaison, Public Relations with media and industry, support staff for demos and take shows, training materials, logo bearing goods. At lesser numbers . . and I don't know that $100M is THE number, but it's on the proper order, many of those things have to occur in serial order rather than simultaneously . . .where some are called on, such as sales, to support other areas. I have not overlooked racing. I have intentionally left it off. Racing falls right behind cocaine and construction in terms of ability to burn amazing amounts of money almost instantly. I am reminded of that everyday I have bad weather and have to pay all this $9K/wk help and the helicopters for NOT working. I would GUESS . . .that one of the instant hurdles is for the investors (Bruce being the most visible) and Erik to sort out who is doing what. If Erik meddles in the business end of it or Bruce in the motorcycle end . . things will be exponentially complicated. You've got a couple real strong personalities who are accustomed to having things their way and yielding very little who need to reconcile lots of big decisions. Trust and confidence is paramount at this stage of the game. I'm, at present, watching as my youngest son navigates a similar situation starting a new company with 3 young men. Take a few "kids", all under 30 and worth well in excess of $100M each, and you get some healthy egos. If you can't see and focus myopically on where you are going . . your IPO is a pipe dream. Erik Buell excels at this and has a couple of the best advisors a person could have. I'm confident. | ||
| Buelliedan |
"If Erik meddles in the business end of it or Bruce in the motorcycle end . . things will be exponentially complicated." I am glad you said that as I have thought the same thing but was afraid I would be crucified if I said it. | ||
| Steveford |
Nobody has mentioned that Honda started out real small (making piston rings) and grew their business over the years by selling to any place that would take their product line on. EBR jumped into the deep end of the pool because that's what they had to work with and that's what Erik likes. They were also expecting Hero to have the tiddlers covered. I would think it would make more sense to have a bread and butter bike for the average person and then have your flagship model for people who are looking for 160 RWHP. Maybe we'll find out soon when this big announcement happens. I would not be surprised if it's electric. | ||
| Hughlysses |
With the news that Dave and Court reported that they are not going to be able to sell the 350 bikes currently in the warehouse I am very pessimistic that EBR is ever going to be a viable company again. I don't think that was stated as a fact, just that it would be far from simple to do. | ||
| Mrakz83 |
I'm no expert, but those bikes now belong to Bruce, right? As his personal property, you'd think that he could probably figure out a way to get something out of them even if selling them one by one private-party style. The road ahead does look daunting but I want to believe that Bruce and Erik wouldn't be doing this unless they really believed that they could make it work... So I choose to be confident, too. | ||
| Buelliedan |
I am starting to lose faith as it seems as if the same things are being done all over again. The old EBR promised us an adventure bike in 2014 which never happened. The new EBR said we would be told of great things at the end of Sep and that also did not happen. Still zero communication from the company to the dealers, etc.. I just do not understand how they think you can keep doing the same thing yet expect different results? I have until the end of the year to to renew my dealers license in CO. If I do not hear from EBR soon I will just let it lapse as I am not going to drop $2,000 if there is no viable product to sell (Message edited by buelliedan on October 06, 2015) | ||
| Hughlysses |
The only thing I can guess about this is that whatever Bruce can say at this point would only lead to more questions, so he elects not to say anything until he can say something definitive. For example, all he may be able to say at this point is something like: "We're trying to secure additional financing, and if that works out, our plan is to pick up the warranties for the existing EBR bikes and give ($$) incentives to existing dealers to remain with us, but we can't say if that will happen or not yet." Nobody would find that statement very satisfying, and if any pending plans fall through it would only piss dealers/owners off worse in the future. I'm sure it's frustrating, but I can see why things may be this way. (Message edited by Hughlysses on October 06, 2015) | ||
| _lightshow |
"Fishhooks" in the "Deep-Pockets?" Whoda thought? | ||
| Hughlysses |
_lightshow- Could you BE any more cryptic in your posts?  | ||
| Steveford |
One way around the EPA certification (I believe) would be from Bruce Belfer to Title them all in his name and then sell them as used models. He could do that directly or through the dealer network. He'd take a hit on the sales tax but they'd be out of the factory and bringing in some revenue. | ||
| Court |
Wow Not sure that starting a new company by committing a class A felony is the keenest strategy. Haha..... It'd make the Corporate Values line tough to swallow. | ||
| Steveford |
That's a Class A Felony? Whoo Hoo! Go for it! Actually, I don't think it is. The man legally owns the motorcycles, they were EPA certified when the sale was made and they would indeed be used bikes once they're Titled to the original owner. You'd be buying a used 2015 EBR from the original owner. | ||
| Hughlysses |
The man legally owns the motorcycles, they were EPA certified when the sale was made and they would indeed be used bikes once they're Titled to the original owner. I'm guessing the catch is (at least right now) that Bruce can't legally title the bikes in the first place. I was wondering if someone like Magpul could use them, but I suspect those bikes were also titled as Buells or EBRs. | ||
| Mickeyq |
Why not convert the existing SX into an Adventure model? The Adventure market is strong--the Uly was very successful. I don't understand why an Adventure bike was produced after the RX. All of us "old" guys are hankering for a kick-a Adventure ride; but, don't want BMW, KTM, Ducati, etc... | ||
| 46champ |
The best way to get some capital going would be to sell some of the bikes as track bikes like the 1125RR's were and part out the rest for spares for the existing fleet that has not seen any support in 6 months. |
