Daily Slideshow: Harley-Davidson Wants to Get Cool with Millennials
It is assumed that a proud legacy brand like Harley-Davidson will always manage to find its niche. While once a symbol of youth and rebellion, the company has had difficulty bringing in the younger generation as customers.
Yesterday's rebels are today's dads and bosses
It is assumed that a proud legacy brand like Harley-Davidson will always manage to find its niche. While once a symbol of youth and rebellion, the company has had difficulty bringing in the younger generation as customers. It's not just Harley-Davidson that's had a tough time luring in the "Millennial Dollar"; motorcycles as a whole have been losing out on their appeal with the younger crowd. Harley's still got it worse than most of the other makers out there. While they've been keeping above ground well enough, one need only look back on their illustrious history to know there's something missing here.
In order to better understand this situation, there are a few questions worth asking. For one, what are millennials looking for in a vehicle? Second-- and perhaps more importantly-- what changing factors are mot accountable for this shift in success? Millennials aren't as enigmatic as some market executives claim they are. Fortunately for Harley fans, the company's already set plans in motion to solve this, and some of them might just pay off.
Price matters
We live in tighter times when it comes to money. Tight wallets lead to practical purchases, often doing away with flights of fancy like biking. Without the assets and tenure of the older generation, millennials tend to be hit the hardest by an economic downturn. Many have a hard enough time finding work or a place to live, and often settle on public transit to get them where they're going. For those millennials who are in the market for wheels, it'd be hard to justify a pricey hog. Harley-Davidson will always have some kind of market for Road Kings, but they'll need to be able to offer lighter variants that have scaled down their cost accordingly.
Smaller and smarter designs play against expectation
When millennials do buy a bike, they apparently tend to gravitate towards the leaner Japanese models. A large part of this is due to the fact that a wide hog isn't as well-suited for shorter trips and city driving. While the Road King will keep to its own niche, Harley-Davidson has made a push to be more diverse and varied. There are smaller, cheaper variants, such as the HD Street bikes, that play closer to the desires of the common millennial.
EV motorcycles for the sustainable future
One plus-side about raking in a fresh generation of customers is that they presumably lack the same ingrained biases (at least not to such an extent) as the long-time veterans. There's been a lot of fuss over whether Harley-Davidson's freewheeling spirit is actually compatible with the inherent limitations of electric vehicles. EV motorcycles have been jeered at for years, and that's not even counting the fact they'd never come close to the empowering roar of the hog we love.
The Millennial generation has thus demonstrated itself to be far more receptive to EV technology. By doubling their investment in EV infrastructure and promising a full-electric production Harley by the end of the decade, it is clear Harley-Davidson are poised to move in on this niche aggressively.
Women are more into bikes than ever
Women have undoubtedly factored into the decision to buy a cool Harley on more than one occasion. They've rarely been a significant part of the riding demographic itself. At least until lately, that is. The same American market trend that supposedly spells peril for the motorcycle industry also show motorcycles becoming more popular amongst women than they've ever been in the past.
Getting those kids hooked with the video games
Releasing on June 29th is the racing video game The Crew 2 from Ubisoft. It is one of the more contemporary (and, we imagine, effective) ways Harley-Davidson are looking to get popular with the youth of today. Working in collaboration with Ubisoft, Harley-Davidson has licensed their bikes to be used in the open-world game. Unlike a well-known series such as Grand Theft Auto, where the vehicle brands are all in-universe and fictional, The Crew 2 will put a number of Harley bikes at the disposal of the gamer. The game's reception has been warm enough, and you can bet at least one bike will find a home thanks to the game's low-key promotion.
It takes a culture to make something cool
Harley-Davidson was once associated with a devil-may-care, counter-cultural spunk a la James Dean. The company may have helped get the ball rolling with the style of advertisements and the necessary product quality to boot. To the extent, it became an American icon, however... Well, you might say it came about naturally. There's no one culprit you can point the finger at that made the Harley bike one generation's definition of cool. If we were to argue, we'd say that "coolness" never went away. It's largely practical reasons that keep newcomers at bay. If those problems were solved one way or another, it wouldn't be hard to imagine the brand roaring back to its iconic status.
Just the way it used to be.
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