Honda Powerhouse

[Novavalker]

I have seen smaller Honda Motorcycle dealerships in my area loose their franchise with Honda. One was run out of a family store for over 20 years. He could undercut other dealerships on price because his store was family owned. Is there a move afoot by Honda to have few dealerships under the Powerhouse format that sell only Honda motorcycles?

[Jack B]

I live in a small city (33000 pop) and we have a small family owned Honda / Suzuki dealer.
He said that Honda would like to see less dealer's but bigger stores. So I think your right we'll see more Powerhouse dealer's.
 

[Big IV]

The motorcycle industry has annual dealership shows that the manufacturers use to lure in dealers to pick up new lines of accessories, brands, scooter, etc. The manufacturers show is a fairly closed door event. I have a buddy that talked his way in. He’s a great salesman, and he convinced them that he was looking to retire and open a motorcycle shop. So they let him in. He really enjoyed the show, seeing the dealer incentives for different brands. He also signed up for the Dealer News magazine.  He brings them to us when he is done with them.

Most of the bike companies are looking to copying that boutique style of dealership. Some are exploring the idea. Some are pushing the idea.

In Charlotte on Freedom Drive is a converted bowling alley that sale Yamaha’s, Kawasaki’s, Suzuki’s, and half a dozen scooter brands.  Directly beside it is an old car dealership that sale Hondas.   It has been that way for years. Of course they are owned by the same people. Yet, they are two separate dealerships with different polo shirts on its employees.

The Honda shop in Gastonia was family owned for 30 years. Honda never pushed him out, although he did reach the point where he wanted to retire, so he sold it to a Powersports company out of Hickory that wanted a store to the South, they didn’t like splitting their attention, so they immediately sold it to a car dealership.  The car dealership has moved it from the small building that it had been in for 20 years into a lumber yard building.  I’m curious to see how they renovate that building, at the moment it is fairly sparse and lackluster.  It looks like a shed with a set of nice glass front offices and a parts counter.

[Gilligan]

I owned a BMW R100R before buying the Valk IS in 1999. The nearest BMW "dealer" was an hour away in Linton, IN. It turned out to be a one-man, mechanic shop with no products to sell. He was only doing work on the old "air heads," because BMW wanted a "super store" that sold not only BMW bikes, but all of the BMW merchandise; and BMW would not allow him to operate anything less.  The same thing happened to the BMW dealership in Indianapolis.

When Navigator and I went to buy a bigger motorcycle to do some serious touring, we ruled out BMW, because of the limited, and decreasing, number of BMW dealerships in the US.  After checking dealership availability for the other makes, we limited the brands to Honda, Suzuki and Kawasaki. (Harley was eliminated because it was overpriced, unreliable and underpowered.) At that point Honda introduced the Valkyrie Interstate. We test rode it, and the rest is history.

We have gone to our local Honda dealership for all of our service and many other things. We always research Honda dealerships near our travel routes, and we have used them many times for oil changes, burned-out light bulbs, etc... The availability of Honda dealerships has been very good. I hope that Honda is not going to do what BMW did.

[six2go #152]

The Honda Dealership where I bought my Valk is in a small town of about 9,000. The building didn't look like much and had the appearance of a small family owned business(which it is). Small as it was in appearance, they do a tremendous volume of business, especially Wings, ATV's, & Dirt Bikes. About 3 years ago Honda told them that they would like for them to become a Power House Dealership which meant they could only sell Honda units. They had to drop the franchise for Yamaha watercraft & snow machines, but they jumped at the chance for a new building. The new Power House building was constructed behind the old building and when it was completed the old place was leveled and became a nice big parking lot. The new building is much larger, brighter, and easier to get around in. Losing the Yamaha deal didn't hurt them any as Honda now has watercraft, and the snow machine sales have not been strong for several years. Best of all, the business is still run by the same family with the same friendly staff and very competent parts and service depts.