Harley Street 750

[bigjohnsd]

https://www.motorcyclistonline.com/firstrides/2014_harley_davidson_street_750_first_ride/

Wonder how long this will last?

Fills a hole in their line-up but............not a great review

 

[Abercrombie FJR]

I'm not a Harley fan cause the discontinued the only two Harleys I would ever consider (XR1200X and the Street Rod) but I think its a hell of a first attempt at that price point. They have them priced aggressively coming in several hundred dollars below the Star Bolt. I myself tend to develop brand loyalty with the first brand I encounter and if that works for other people, Harley may be on to something expanding their entry level bikes beyond the Sportster. My first bike was a Yamaha and first car was a Ford. I have strayed but overall I am pretty loyal to those two brands.

 

[wfooshee]

It's got some things Harley needs people to accept in order to survive. Air-cooled motors are getting harder and harder to smog.... But for "modern" it don't cut it. I've seen folks say "Hey, look! An old Honda Shadow!"

I think Harley is in a pickle...... All the Harley guys want a ******* HARLEY-DAVIDSON!!!!! No damn radiators, no damn smooth-running engines, no damn light-weight (well..... compared to.....) bikes. So they have to make it as "traditional" as they possibly can, which lends force to criticism like "Hey, look! an old Honda Shadow!"

 

[Pterodactyl]

I've never even sat on a Harley and I am not a fan, but their marketing and mystique building abilities are worthy of great admiration. They sell you a bike with an engine of over 1500cc, that produces less than 80 BHP, weighs 880 lbs and charge you nearly $24K. Then they charge you an extra few thousand dollars to replace the front suspension with springer technology that was obsolete 30 years ago. That takes chutzpah.

When I lived in Fairbanks the local BMW dealer and HD dealer merged. I got to know the service manager and later finance manager well. He was a HD master mechanic and a true blue Harley guy. He told me about the various marketing strategies of the five manufacturers they sold and the Harley approach was far and away the slickest. If one applied for credit through Harley they would generally approve the buyer for about $5k more than the bike cost; the extra could be used to add accessories and buy clothing. There are Harley shops in Skagway, outside of Denali Park and in one or two other tourist areas. These shops sell nothing but HD branded clothing, mostly T-shirts, and they make huge profits for their mother shops in Anchorage or Fairbanks.

Harley may be the victim of their own success. The market is flooded with late model low mileage bikes for sale on the used market, just look at Craig's list. Been awhile since I looked at their market performance, but I know for awhile a few years ago they were laying off workers in significant numbers

 

[BkerChuck]

As a Harley dealership employee, I can add a little insight here. Most dealerships make a significant percentage of their profits on the sales of clothing and "lifestyle" merchandise. Harley actually encourages dealerships to open "AROs" or alternative retail outlets which are smaller substores of the main dealership just to sell these items in resort and tourist areas. Depending on state laws, bike sales may not even be permitted in these smaller outlets.

The Street 500 and 750 bikes were primarily developed in India for the growing Asian market and as I understand will be shipped to the US in knock-down kit form for final assembly in the Kansas City plant. This is similar to what HD is doing with bikes being sent to India for sale in Asian markets. They send incomplete Fat Boy models in a knock down form over to them for final assembly. Dealerships are being flooded with "propaganda" to build our enthusiasm for these new models. This kool aid tastes funny....

Harley is trying to stress how great these new entry level bikes are going to be especially for riders training programs since they chose to screw over Buell and the almost 200 American employees they showed to the door in 2010. I live very close to York, PA and their final assembly plant where all of the touring line and Softail lines are built. My own brother in law lost his job when Harley chose to eliminate their transportation department and subcontract deliveries out to a lower cost bidder. Our dealership has seen increasingly higher numbers of damaged bikes from the shoddy handling by the new trucking firms. Almost half of the full time employees were permanently laid off only to be given the chance to return as "caual employees" an on-call system for less money and no benefits. Oh, and if they work more then 11 days in a month they charge them union dues although they have no union protections.

They are also planning on now marketing the 883 Sporster as the next step up fro the new "Street" line. The day an 883 Sportster is a step up from anything more than a mini-bike is a sad day.

 

[Lauren_TK]

I have to say that *the* most pleasent sales experience I've ever had was when I test roade the HD Electraglide.

If the bike was only partially right more me, I may have bit. However, it wasn't, so I didn't.

That being said, the only time I've contacted a sales person after I've purchased a different product, was when I emailed the sales person to tell her how much I enjoyed the interaction.