Motorcycle and Harley

Question #2 In America and Japan, Harley has shifted the positioning of its products away from simple motorcycles and more toward being status symbols of a particular way of life. Can this positioning succeed in Asia, Africa, and South America? Why or why not?

Currently H-D is the leading seller of heavy weight motorcycles across the entire world. Because they are at the pinnacle they are the target for the competition. Some of Harley Davidson 's advantages are name recognition, brand loyalty, brand quality and customer loyalty (Hitt, Ireland & Hoskisson, 2013, p. 81). The company benefits by having “the made in America” image attached to its products. The image of a Harley rider and owner is one of a tough, independent, free spirit, ready and willing to take on the world type of man. The sound of a H-D motorcycle in idle or being ridden is unique and very identifiable.

The marketing mix concept often referred to as the “4Ps” (McCarthy, 1964), as a means of translating marketing planning into practice (Bennett, 1997) is one of the fundamental concepts of marketing theory. Marketing mix is not a scientific theory, but merely a conceptual framework that identifies thee principal

McCarthy used the ‘4ps’ to define the marketing mix. The ‘4ps’ are shown in the table below (3.1).

products, have attracted a lot of customers throughout the world. The company has a huge

Customers are having high income and want from a particular bike to suit their individual needs.

Beals realized the big necessity to implement Japanese techniques & programs in production for better quality products.

According to me, the motorcycle industry is very attractive. The main reason to back my claim is the level of competition in the industry. There is a very high level of completion between all the companies present in this particular segment. The main factors that drive this rivalry are different positions of different players within the industry, differences in technical know-how, different marketing campaigns, differences in core nature of the products and differences in strategies. The players in this particular industry don’t fight over price of their products, they rather compete with each other in terms quality of their products and the nature of their services to different segments of customers. Each player had its own unique strategy and nature of the product for a particular segment of customers, this tends to intensify the competition amongst companies in the industry.

Bodie Industrial Supply, Inc is a full service distributor of top line, brand name, new and used certified machine tools, maintenance parts and related equipments for the construction, utility and farming markets. The demand for equipment is relatively cyclical, with Bodies having a slight increase in sales to farming markets in the summer. Bodie’s has seen a huge sales growth increase in 2003-2004 of 72% and 29% in 2004-2005. This is mostly due to an increase in net sales and keeping a constant level of costs of goods sold.

Harley-Davidson 's promotion is designed to move customers from ignorance to awareness. Harley-Davidson 's advertisements contain very little if any persuasive material on specific models or comparisons between other brands. Instead, they simply show the product in use in a typical setting. Because Harley-Davidson has built such a strong reputation over the years, much of their promotion occurs through word of mouth. At this stage in the company 's long history their main promotional goal is simply to inform customers that the company still exists.

Historically Harley-Davidson to be a Niche Marketer, which is they had focused in on one particular aspect of the market. Kotler and Keller identified the following characteristics of niche marketing; customers have a distinct set of needs, they are willing to pay more to the firm that best suits their needs, it is not likely to attract competitors, gains economies through specialized products and it has a size, profit and to grow. Almost all of these hold true for the “heavyweight” segment of motor cycles that Harley-Davidson produced.

Harley Davidson is known as one of the main motorcycle manufacturers and sellers in the United States. The company had good business and great market share in the early 1960s when it commanded a total of about 70% 0f the motorcycle market, before the invasion or the intrusion of a small Japanese firm that manufactured lighter motorcycles, known as the Honda. The case study as identifies that Harley Davidson assumed the invasion by the Japanese firm and instead of tackling the competition, it waited for a long time which resulted in the company losing its command in the motorcycle market in the United States. Lack of action by the management of Harley Davidson resulted in the failure of the company

importer and exporter of raw materials and per assembled parts from their vast group of certified

The website of Harley Davidson gave us a new concept of Motorcycles! The extension of this website is exceptional. The virtual Customer Service in this website is notorious and extremely helpful. From other motorcycles websites this is one of the most professionals ones where the customer can get a flavor of the company from products up to their businesses profits and others...Harley Davidson publishes material related to all aspects of their motorcycles and provides to their own and the general public good information, expanding their products and other services with local information for countries around the world. Their information and technology, including digital libraries, metadata, authorization and

the actual market trend is rewarding Ducati performance motorcycles, since customers are more interested in untraditional design and technologically advanced features;