Sales of Cruisers Revving Up

By JOHN O’DELL

Jan. 22, 1996 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

CYPRESS —

When the Beach Boys sang about their little Honda in 1964, it wasn’t the Japanese-made car that had captured their attention.

They were talking about a 50-cc motorbike that began appearing in Honda shops around the country in the early 1960s and started a revolution.

Until then, American males in jeans and black leather jackets tooled around on hefty Harley-Davidsons and roaring Nortons, Triumphs and BMWs: motorcycles, with a capital M.

But suddenly it was all light- and mid-weight dirt bike-derivatives with names like Ninja. Harley-Davidson nearly went bankrupt and the European bikes all but disappeared.

That’s changing now as America rediscovers the so-called cruiser motorcycles: thick-tired, high-powered bikes with chrome engines, metal-flake teardrop gas tanks and high-rise handlebars.

Harley-Davidson, which was almost knocked out in the early 1980s from a combination of heavy Japanese competition and its own internal management and marketing problems, has recovered to regain its place as the country’s premier cruiser motorcycle maker.

But the four major Japanese motorcycle importers--Honda in Torrance and Kawasaki, Suzuki and Yamaha in Orange County--are waging a cutthroat battle for the rest of a share of the market.

This month, three of the four Japanese motorcycle manufacturers who sell in the U.S. are jumping into the heavy cruiser market.

On Sunday, Cypress-based Yamaha Motor Corp. U.S.A. launches its top-of-the-line heavyweight, the Royal Star, with a pair of 30-second television ads that will run during the Super Bowl telecast.

American Honda Motor Co., which had one of the first of the Japanese manufacturers’ cruiser-styled bikes, unveiled its heavyweight power cruiser, the six-cylinder Valkyrie, to the motorcycle press on Friday and intends to start its retail advertising campaign next month.

The third new entry, debuting in retail stores in March after a media preview this month, is from Irvine-based Kawasaki Motors Corp. U.S.A. The bike, called the Vulcan Classic, features a lower, more compact 1940s look borrowed from onetime Harley competitor Indian Motorcycles, which folded in 1951.

Brea-based Suzuki is the only Japanese company not introducing a big cruiser to its line this year, and industry insiders said the company is expected to have a heavyweight in 1998.

Yamaha stylist Ed Burke, who spent five years developing the Royal Star at the company’s Cypress design studio, says the heavy cruiser is a direct response to the aging baby boom generation.

As they’ve gotten older and wealthier, many boomers are indulging in things that were familiar when they were teenagers. They’re rediscovering icons like the convertible sports car, meatloaf and mashed potatoes and the cruiser motorcycle.

Yamaha is targeting buyers who found the sport in the early 1970s, abandoned it for the next 15 or 20 years to raise families and pursue careers and now have the leisure and the wherewithal to get back in the saddle.

“But they want something that is familiar and comfortable,” Burke said.

So the new super cruisers come equipped with hefty shock absorbers and padded, low-slung seats to accommodate riders who no longer can contort themselves into the aggressive bent-forward positions demanded by many of the racing-styled motorcycles.

The first Japanese-built cruisers hit the market at the end of the 1970s and the style has been in all four companies’ lineups since the early ‘80s. But until a few years ago, cruisers were just a small part of a market dominated by sports or race-styled bikes and by the commuter or everyday motorcycles.

It wasn’t marketing genius, though, that prompted the Japanese to start introducing cruiser styles, said Jim Bates, spokesman for American Honda’s motorcycle division.

“It was just a styling decision. This is an industry made up of a lot of niches, and this was one of them we thought we should have something for. It started really small, and then just suddenly took off,” Bates said. “The acceptance [of cruisers] was just amazing to all of us in the industry.”

Cruisers are defined by Harley-Davidson as motorcycles with two cylinder V-twin engines and by the other manufacturers as motorcycles that have a semi-customized look and are designed for day or weekend jaunts rather than racing, rough cross-country riding or lengthy journeys.

For most of the 1980s they accounted for less than 20% of the motorcycle market, but by 1990 cruisers accounted for more than a third of the 208,000 street bikes sold in the U.S. Last year, 103,330 of 202,925 street motorcycles sold--51% of the total--were cruisers, according to Irvine-based industry analyst Don Brown.

John Davidson has bought several of them over the years--the 52-year-old Fountain Valley man’s collection of 11 motorcycles includes four Harley-Davidsons, several Honda cruisers and a customized Kawasaki Vulcan. Three weeks ago, he added a Yamaha Royal Star.

“It is the complete cruiser,” he enthuses. “I’m really into nostalgia, and this has that timeless, ageless look that is just right.”

Yamaha is so convinced of the Royal Star’s importance that it is spending $1.3 million on the two Super Bowl spots--”a good portion of our entire North American motorcycle ad budget for the year,” said marketing director Bob Starr.

The 728-pound motorcycle, with a base price of $13,499, is the first of the Japanese bikes to compete directly against the Harley-Davidson line, which includes the classic wide-bodied “Fat Boy” whose styling many of the Japanese cruiser bikes emulate.

Yamaha says it won’t flood the market with Royal Stars, keeping first-year production at just a few thousand units. But the marketing campaign is aimed at using the bike as a signature model to increase overall awareness of the entire Yamaha line.

Ditto the Valkyrie. The cruiser, built at Honda’s plant in Marysville, Ohio, has a more modern look than others, but still shares styling with the motorcycles of the past. Its price--$12,499 for the base model--pits it, like the Royal Star, against Harley-Davidson’s $12,000 to $14,000 cruiser lines.

With a $10,499 price tag--$1,500 higher than the 1995 top-of-the-line Vulcan cruiser--the Kawasaki Classic is the least expensive of the new crop of big bikes. But the price tag still puts its well out of what most consumers have come to consider the Japanese bike price range.

Kawasaki product manager John Hoover says he’s not worried. “We would not be building a bike like this if our customers hadn’t been asking for it,” Hoover said.

Harley-Davidson is not the competition, though, he maintains.

“Harley buyers are not just buying a bike, they are buying an entire lifestyle,” Hoover said. “And our marketing tests show that a lot of our potential buyers say they don’t want that lifestyle, they just want the custom look and feel.”

Yamaha, alone among the Japanese bike makers, is jumping into the customizing business as well, with a line of Royal Star accessories and clothing that its dealers can market right along with the bikes.

It won’t be difficult, said Starr, for a well-heeled buyer to drop $22,000 on a tricked-up Royal Star without ever leaving the dealer’s showroom.

Analyst Jones says the cruiser boom is a blessing for the entire motorcycle industry, but worries that the bike makers aren’t focusing far enough ahead and may get caught short when the boomers get too old to ride.

But Burke and other industry insiders are more sanguine. This is not only the wealthiest generation ever, it is the healthiest, the designer said. Many riders who are 40 today will still be going strong 25 years from now.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Motorcycling Redefined

U.S. motorcycle sales, which peaked in the 1970s, are picking up as aging baby boomers rediscover the hobbies of their youth. Cruiser bikes, a compromise between racy motorcycles and the heavyweight touring models, now account for more than half of U.S. on-highway motorcycle sales.

Two-Wheel Trend

The energy crisis and a flood of baby boomers pushed motorcycle sales to a peak in 1973. Estimated retail sales of two-wheel motorcycles (including off-road models):

1960: 60,000

1970: 750,000

1973: 1,520,000

1975: 940,000

1980: 1,070,000

1985: 405,000

1990: 261,000

1995: 299,000

Cruisers Hit the Road

Sales of cruisers have increased almost 80% between 1991 and 1995, and now account for more than half of the street-bike market:

*--*

Sales Street market share 1991 58,000 37% 1992 71,000 43 1993 85,000 46 1994 91,000 46 1995 103,000 51

*--*

Who Rides

Motorcycle rider demographics, based on 1994 survey data:

Average age: 32.6

Sex: 93% male

Marital status: 56% married

Education: 79% completed high school, 40% at least some college

Median annual income: $33,200

Four Decades of Motorcycle Ridership

1960s: Japanese manufacturers enter U.S. motorcycle market

1970s: Energy crisis makes motorcycles popular. Off-highway ridership drops due to liability concerns and stricter environmental laws. Bulk of baby boomer population comes of age and becomes industry’s target market.

1980s: Off-road and dual-purpose motorcyclists of the 1960s and ‘70s discover racy street bikes. Total ridership drops as boomers become more involved in family and career pursuits.

1990s: Aging baby boomers rediscover motorcycling, switching from racers to cruisers; Harley-Davidson experiences a resurgence.

Harley-Davidson vs. Honda

Wisconsin-based Harley-Davidson Inc. and four major Japanese motorcycle manufacturers are engaged in an ongoing battle. Harley gained the upper hand against Honda in 1992, but fell to second place in 1993 and remained there in 1994. Market share, U.S. motorcycle sales:

1992

Harley-Davidson: 26.9%

Honda: 25.2

Suzuki: 15.4

Yamaha: 15.1

Kawasaki: 14.2

All others: 3.2

1994

Honda: 29.0%

Harley-Davidson: 26.7

Yamaha: 14.0

Kawasaki: 13.7