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Harley-Davidson President resigns
- Thread starter TK4
- Start date
*shrug*
You can draw a line anywhere in the sand and say, "That's when men stopped becoming real men."
Maybe it's when we started driving automatic transmissions. Or maybe it's when we stopped making fire by rubbing a stick against a stone.
Every generation's going to look at the upcoming one and call them sissies for not walking to school 5 kms, barefoot uphill in the snow. Both ways.
Every single time.
LOL, all i could think of while reading this was a flashback to dial up internet connections.
-Remember the early days of the internet when you had to decide on how good something *cough someone* looked by the thumbnail because the full picture took about 2 minutes to completely load onto the screen.
-Internet disconnects when someone picked up another phone in the house/or having to get off when someone wanted to make a call.
-Late night gaming sessions, had to wrap my external modem in a towel so that travesty of a connection noise didn't wake up my parents.
-Having to get sooooo good at prediction shots in gaming due to high ping (shout out to anyone who remembers being an HPB)
Mad Mike
Well-known member
Guess what -- they are sissies! Sorry if it's offensive to make the observation but I don't see the same participation in rough and tumble stuff I remember as a kid -- they've grown up bubblewrapped. I don't know a kid with a dirtbike. Highschool football is all but dead. In some parts of Ontario kids no longer try out for competitive hockey teams.
Does it bother me - nope, to each his/hers/theirs own.
Dial-up Internet?
Sissy!
When I was young, to get data from one computer to another, you had to physically walk the box of punch cards over to the reader connected to the other computer.
Then magnetic tape readers were invented, and we called them sissies too...
TK4
Well-known member
Into the wind
I see kids today doing stuff far more dangerous and exciting than "team sports"
www.familyeducation.com
Kids and Extreme Sports: Should They Be Allowed?
Should kids do extreme sports? BMX riders, snowboarders and X Game stars weigh in on the benefits and risks of kids doing extreme sports.
J_F
Guest
I've had PC's on the 'net since AOL dial up days
and some pretty basic machines in use before there was a net
only ever had one infection: Junkie Virus
it was spread by infected floppy disks
turned out the South Asian gentlemen that built/sold me the PC
inadvertently gave me the Junkie while provisioning the CD ROM drive
this was new tech at the time and they had a really hard time getting DOS/Win 3.1 to see the hardware
I watched them do this, while waiting to pick my screaming fast new 486DX4-100 machine
they had a drawer full of driver disks and kept trying different ones until they got the right driver
we were all very excited when DOS handed the machine to 3.1 without hanging
and then there was a CD ROM ready for action
Junkie was easy to kill, they're all easy to kill
the AV industry has everyone scared up to make $$ from them
ScorpionT16
Well-known member
Somehow I feel the Harley CEO saw what has happened to Norton, and it's CEO right now, how they tried to save that company time and time again yet stay true to their roots (even if it lead to fraudulent demeanour), maybe Harley's CEO didn't want to end up down that path and we aren't aware of the companies internal politics or structure.
I would hazard a guess that job was a washing machine ride for the last 6 months and he'll have a parachute package that will see him through till the next CEO job comes along, and they always do for guys at that level.
Maybe the next guy can help them out of the slump.
Maybe the next guy can help them out of the slump.
Mad Mike
Well-known member
if I recall HD brought in a marketing guy from the car market last year. You can see some noise already about reworking the dealer network, which for HD is among their biggest strengths... but also one of its biggest weaknesses.
I’m guessing more small dealers, particularly in big urban markets. More focus on the Street line, possibly a rework on their pricing model.
Gonna be fun to watch.
I’m guessing more small dealers, particularly in big urban markets. More focus on the Street line, possibly a rework on their pricing model.
Gonna be fun to watch.
You may be onto something. Adding additional dealers that only carry the small bikes and electrics leaves the old dealers to carry the big bikes. That fixes many of the problems and can work well (I'm thinking like VW/Audi, Honda/Acura etc.). If a barge dealer wants to sell the other bikes, they can, but those that are worried about diluting their barges with adv bikes can remain with the current line. This gives HD more dealerships (although I don't think that is their problem) but more importantly puts the bikes in the hands of a sales team that loves them and isn't focused on sliding buyers into the higher profit bikes.
The other way for HD to update the dealership culture is to meter out the big bikes. Let the dealer have a big bike for every two of the new design bikes they move. That incentivizes the dealers to care about the new lines. Those that crap on them will get steamrolled as they won't have stock to work with.
Forcing dealers to move 2/3 for 1 on a product mix is a very dangerous business model. The saleman want to move the product with the largest margin FOR THEM, its a commission base business for most. They will happily ignore smaller bikes, or even tank sales (Buell) . Its been tried in the automotive world and marine and it ends badly.
The move to the "lifestyle" stores was in my mind a bad one and I'm not sure how you go backwards on that, dealers have hundreds of thousands tied up in showroom space.
Dictating to the dealer network, on a brand formed on being individual sounds risky.
The move to the "lifestyle" stores was in my mind a bad one and I'm not sure how you go backwards on that, dealers have hundreds of thousands tied up in showroom space.
Dictating to the dealer network, on a brand formed on being individual sounds risky.
Issuing an ATS0 command to the modem would have disabled the speaker for you.
In related news, my brain is apparently still full of now useless outdated information such as dialup modem commands and init strings. ?
The Proposal movie (2009) with Sandra Bullock had her in Alaska needing to send an email. She goes to an internet cafe, turns on the computer and hears the connection warble. The look on her face was priceless. I wonder how many people would get the humour today?
Huh whut? My local (at the time) Yamaha dealer (Johnny Clare) did nothing but expand since I started dealing with them in the 70s. The other one (Pete Lapp) always did well.
35 years ago I was buying my parts from a guy running the entire Eastern Canada importing/sales out of his basement for a marque that didn't really get their **** together till this millennium. Now that was sketchy.
I was wondering how a company bridge finances a transition to a different market.
The HD situation is complex because of international markets, legislation etc but look at a restaurant in a changing market.
There was a restaurant in Brampton that was a beef and beer kind of place but the area ethnic mix slowly changed and it didn't. The old regulars still kept coming but were dwindling. As long as there was a profit there was no change in menu.
It takes years to establish a regular clientele and a change in menu would drive off the old regulars. Anyone can follow a recipe but the results are better when the style of cooking is in the chef's blood.
IMO, for the restaurant, it should change the name, menu, redecorate and reopen. Cut the ties and move forward. It would take years to make up for the costs.
For HD it would be little different from Warren Buffet starting a motorcycle company. Would it be viable 10 years down the road or would it be T shirts only.
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