Sales Down, Revenues Up
at Harley-Davidson
H
arley-Davidson released its
second quarter 2019 report
last week, revealing decreased
worldwide retail sales (down
8.4%), but increased revenue, up
5.6% over last year's Q2. Despite
the continued slide in motorcycles
sales, the report is better than ex-
pected but has still prompted the
Motor Company to scale back the
estimate of shipped motorcycles
for the year. It now anticipates be-
tween 212,000 and 217,000 units
will be shipped in 2019, down
5000 units from its April estimate.
In its 2019 outlook, the report
mentioned that Harley-Davidson
was looking forward to EU tariff
relief, adding that the process has
taken longer than the company
originally anticipated. "Harley-
Davidson recently obtained
regulatory approvals confirming
that motorcycles shipped from the
company's Thailand operations to
the EU would receive more favor-
able treatment than if they were
shipped from the U.S." While that
doesn't bode well for American
manufacturing, it's a welcome
relief on the global scale for the
company as it continues to set its
sights on international growth.
Second-quarter sales were
down 8.0% in the U.S., and 8.9%
internationally, the biggest de-
clines happening in the Europe/
Middle East and Canada markets.
Despite citing growth of 77% in
Southeast Asia, overall sales in
the Asian Pacific market saw a
slight decrease of 0.6%.
In the report, Harley-Davidson
touched on its collaboration with
Qianjiang Motorcycle Company
in creating a small displacement
model directed at the Chinese
market for 2020, and also pointed
to the success of the new Thailand
manufacturing plant in supplying
the Southeast Asian market.
While the downward trend con-
tinues for Harley, it's not all doom
and gloom, as there are signs that
The Motor Company's efforts to
recruit younger riders are start-
ing to work. They report that their
U.S. rider training participating
is up, with the greatest increase
among 18-34-year-olds. The same
segment is up by 2.7% in new
retail sales in the U.S. for Q2—a
small increase, but an increase
nonetheless.
See the full Harley-Davidson
2019 second quarter report at
https://investor.harley-davidson.
com/financials.
Jean Turner
IN
THE
WIND
P28
Harley's
worldwide retail
sales are down
but revenue is up.
