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CNN Live At Daybreak
President Bush Heads for Hog Heaven
Aired August 20, 2001 - 07:23 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: President Bush is heading for hog heaven today -- on his schedule: a tour of the Harley-Davidson motorcycle plant in Milwaukee. The Harley has become a showpiece of American know-how.
CNN's Brian Palmer tells us what makes some people go hog wild for a Harley.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRIAN PALMER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Why do Harley- Davidson motorcycles command such loyalty?
UNIDENTIFIED RIDER: If I had to explain, you wouldn't understand.
PALMER: For hard core owners, the Harley is much more than a motorcycle.
UNIDENTIFIED RIDER: I guess it's a piece of Americana. It's like apple pie, baseball and Harley-Davidsons. It's, they're different, just like America is different.
GLENN STEELE, HARLEY-DAVIDSON DEALER: There's a mystique. There's a charisma. People love the product. People who don't own Harley-Davidsons buy all the accessories and the paraphernalia and the collectibles. People tattoo Harley-Davidson on their bodies.
PALMER: Harley-Davidson is bigger than motorcycles. It's a quintessential American brand. Last quarter, the company sold more than $30 million in merchandise alone -- jackets shirts, stuffed animals. Founded in 1903, Harley-Davidson is the only major producers of motorcycles left in the United States. Harleys served in WWI and II, but the company hit hard times in the late '60s and '70s.
But Harley-Davidson rose from the ashes in the '80s when company executives bought the firm from its previous owner then took it public, ushering in a stretch of golden years.
STEELE: I kept telling myself through the late '80s and early '90s that this couldn't last forever and it was going to stop eventually and it hasn't. It's just gotten better and better and better every year.
PALMER: As the company changed, so did its customers.
UNIDENTIFIED RIDER: There is Harley riders and there's a new breed of Harley riders, you know, the so-called stock broker rider.
PALMER: The average Harley owning household earns $73,000 a year, nearly twice the figure for 1987. Anthony Casio (ph) is a mechanical engineer, not a stock broker.
ANTHONY CASIO, MECHANICAL ENGINEER: I got my first Harley back in '85 shortly after I got married. The Harley lasted longer than the marriage.
PALMER: More women are riding Harleys, too. Marie Schneider (ph) from Connecticut started five months ago.
MARIE SCHNEIDER, HARLEY-DAVIDSON OWNER: When you're on a sport bike, you're like flying down the road. When you're on a Harley, you're riding, you're cruising. It's just, it's a different feeling.
PALMER: Harley watchers say the company is trying to promote a more forward looking image while still holding on to Harley loyalists. One way it hopes to grab younger riders, the sleek 2002 V-Rod motorcycle, a 115 horsepower bike with an engine co-designed with Porsche. Nor your grandpa or grandma's Harley.
Brian Palmer, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: Well, we heard from Harley dealer Glenn Steele in that report. He's a fourth generation motorcycle dealer and he owns the Bloomfield, New Jersey dealership opened by his father and uncle back in 1955. And that is where he is right now. Good morning, Glenn.
STEELE: Hi, Carol.
LIN: Hey, it's hard to believe that Harley is about to celebrate its 100th anniversary.
STEELE: Yes, it is hard to believe. I haven't been around that long.
LIN: Now, you're doing a world tour. As I understand it, the company is going to be riding motorcycles across five continents and a big party is going to culminate in a year's time in Milwaukee, expecting 200,000 people. That's some celebration.
STEELE: Yes, it is. Harley riders are very enthusiastic about the product.
LIN: And who is Harley's biggest competition right now? Anybody?
STEELE: Harley is dominating the market. They have competition from the Japanese brands, but quite often we'll get a Japanese brand owner in here a few weeks after he's purchased a bike and when he rode down the street nobody looked, so he came in here to get a real one.
LIN: Has Harley ever tried to formally capitalize on the backlash against Japanese products, Japanese brand bikes in order to compete better in the marketplace?
STEELE: They petitioned for tariffs years ago and actually had them removed before the time period for the tariffs was over because they had gone through such a resurgence because of the popularity of the product with the American public.
LIN: Well, as reporter Brian Palmer just told us and just showed us, the Harley buyer is certainly changing quite a bit. They're older, a lot richer, a little pudgier. Is this the target audience right now? Is that where the money is to be made?
STEELE: They are older, about 10 years older than they were 15 years ago, and the target audience is your next door neighbor. It's the policeman, the stock broker, or a doctor, a lawyer, anybody.
LIN: Well, Honda right now is targeting a much younger audience, people in their '20s, with a hot new bike. What is it that Harley has to compete with that and does Harley even want to have a 20-year-old rider, someone who maybe only makes $30,000 a year?
STEELE: Well, sure, why not? We have entrance level motorcycles, the 883, and we have a new V-Rod, the custom American muscle bike, which is designed, a completely new motorcycle from the ground up, not a part on it from anywhere else. And it should be a world beater.
LIN: Well, back in the dark days of the late '60s and '70s, I understand that the company really had to reinvent itself and at one point company executives, company employees decided to buy the company outright. Do you know much about that battle and what gave them the chutzpah to think that they could pull it off?
STEELE: Well, they did it in the, actually in the early '80s, and they put a few million dollars down and wound up with a company that's gone through the roof.
LIN: And it looks like you're doing pretty well yourself. A lot of accessories there.
STEELE: Thank you.
LIN: All right, thanks so much for joining us this morning, Glenn. Good luck and happy anniversary.
STEELE: You're welcome. Thank you, Carol.
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