Another dealer struggling (England)

[Rufus]

Morning all,

You know how we often lament what’s happened to the used value of our R18’s (all variants). Well, here is another little example of what’s going on behind the scene, in our bike market anyway.

Via Moto is an established motorcycle dealer in Sheffield (pretty big city in England for those overseas) and they’ve sold big brands such as Honda, also Moto Guzzi and lots of scooters. I bought a Guzzi from there a few years ago.

Well, they’ve moved out of the City centre and to much smaller premises citing Clean Air Zone charges and vehicle restrictions as having a direct impact on customers PLUS manufacturers forcing unrealistic stock volumes onto them (that they literally cant sell). Now where have we heard that before?! Sound familiar.

So, in the new premises (Barnsley) they are only selling NORTON and CF Moto (Chinese bikes). All the other brands have been dropped.

There’s another dealer in Sheffield, called SMC (that I don’t personally know much about) that’s gone aswell. There is an article in the press, MCN (motorcycle news) you may like to Google and read yourselves instead of this paraphrased ramble of mine.

Anyhow, to conclude, it seems to me it really must be a struggle selling motorcycles nowadays, due to falling demand, eco mentalist legislation, overheads and unrealistic demands from manufacturers that bulk drop bikes on dealers in a saturated market.

The way things are going (around me at least) BMW will be the only dealer left because all the others will have gone.

 

[Hammo]

Yes i fully understand your story , a well known established bike shop near me has been there 25/30 years sold all makes and second hand then all of a sudden Honda stated they wanted there bikes in a separate area of the shop , when told that the owner had to pay for the revamp of the shop he said no way , hence Honda pulled there bikes and put them with there car dealership , i paid £13.995 for my "22" plate R18 Classic hate to imagine what it is worth now , its getting a very cut throat business.

 

[Rufus]

Yea, brutal is a great word to describe the market. I think the only way we can win or at least kid ourselves that we win is to keep our bikes and that way we paid what we paid. Period (as you say). Having visited a Honda and Kawasaki dealer over here this last few weeks I noticed there really wasn’t much choice at all of used stuff like there used to be, nothing interesting or unusual and nothing very old, I’d say before 2018/19. They must be refusing a lot of p/x trade ins or doing something with them (sending off to auction?). Prices are high too. If you are not already on the PCP train buying a bike in the old fashioned way (outright or by bank loan so you own it) is a bit of a non starter because we now know, we get absolutely screwed on trade in value,