Global superbike makers Harley Davidson and Triumph have announced new, low-displacement bikes for emerging markets that will directly aim at the portfolio of Royal Enfield.
Unsurprisingly, the global majors are targeting the mid-size segment of 250-700 cc.
A dozen models are planned over next three to five years, offering a range of new bikes from 350 cc to 650 cc and above. Work is going on at the company’s UK development centre, with critical feedback from India.
This will be the biggest product launch by Royal Enfield under the ownership of Eicher Motors.
well everybody knows Royal Enfields are garbages with frequent junk occurring, break pedals getting twisted, chain sprockets needing a fix on every single long ride coupled with backdated tech where not even a fuel gauge is provided on highest selling variants, so obviously, going by today’s standards, it is well known among real bike riders that in today’s world, enfields are mostly junks. But then, enfield has a great brand value in the eyes of wanna be riders and show off stuff, which happens a lot in India… So i don’t think such kind of news or anything would impact enfield. The company knows its strength and utilizing that making loads of money selling junk, but for shareholders, its cool. Such kind of news would not have any impact.
Have a look at the discontentment people have had with Pegasus especially when ABS enabled Bullets have been offered. Check this thread out.
Similar story with Himalayan earlier in 2017 I believe. Its not that other bikes dont have problems for instance the rim bending episode of earlier Duke 390s.
This is something i have been wondering about for a while but see that it hasn’t been discussed in this thread before, nor can I find conclusive evidence for. Does the company do product placements in movies? Is this what they mean by “focus advertising” here? There are just hundreds of RE bikes in Indian movies that it can’t be a coincidence. The more the bikes appear in movies, the more I see them on the street and consequently more it appears in movies - Sort of a life imitates art imitates life kinda feedback loop.
These are a handful of them I found while searching. I find that there is a sub-trend within this trend as well - some directors like Gautam Menon seem to have it in pretty much every other movie which makes me wonder aloud if its all (not so subtle) product placement. Does anyone know?
I don’t know if it is RE doing the product placement or directors / actors actually opting for RE bikes because of the pure machismo / cool factor involved (and lack of any real ‘manly /cool Indian Bike’ options). I personally don’t think it is paid for. If money is the sole criteria some other bike makers can simply plonk more money for this and have only their bike(s) being shown in movies (for e.g. Bajaj Avenger). But then the machismo / coolness will go missing.
There are dime a dozen movies with REs being used - I remember Varun Dhawan riding one in Badrinath Ki Dulhania. Arjun Rampal in Kahini 2. By far the best was Katrina Kaif riding one in Zindagi na milegi doobara. I keep noticing it all the time. Last it appeared in a tourism India ad too. You are right this plays a significant role in people wanting to own a RE (IMO at least).
Here is an article on the movies it has appeared in -
Indians wont remove plastic paper from the seat and you believe that one will throw RE in trash? If I want to give my very old RE for free to a randomly selected person, there will be a queue of 1 km at least.
Company is facing a HR problem. Already 10000 motorcycles production has been lost. From what I understand from enclosed reports, a settlement with labour commissioner could not be implemented due to management not agreeing with the same, even though they might have initially agreed for the same, since such settlements are made only with the participation of management. The company went ahead with an 8 day pay cut apart from demanding a written assurance from the striking employees not to repeat the same. When this issue was also sorted out, company wanted to partially reopen the plant from Monday, but that was again scuttled due to workers being asked to deposit mobile phones at the gate which seems to have been a new demand from the management. All this seems to be poor HR tactics from Management. It also seems that due to some unknown reasons management is delaying to restart the plant and either using the strike as a convenient excuse or wants to teach a lesson to the striking workers. The same is affecting the share price and yesterdays share price jump seemed to be a dead bounce. One brokerage has even come out with an 18000 target price.
Royal Enfield talks of partial reopening of Chennai plant
There r few factors affecting the sales ie continued increase in fuel cost.RE bikes are @low mileage.second factor is 5yrs initial insurance for 2wheelers which must be increasing the cost be 20to 30 thousands.Third is the nbfc curtailing financing and fourth is the interest rates hike. Increase in steel prices and dollar rupee conversion, increase in import duty are others which will force cos to increase prices All of them together are impacting the sales of automobile industry.
Worth watching, not only for Eicher Motors but to understand what is important for Long Term thinking and acheiving Global competency.
Amazing. Yet to see this kind of passion and planning from most of the Indian Companies. Ten years of Eicher Volvo JV and Royal Enfield Future plan
bounce. One brokerage has even come out with an 18000 target price.
