Cycle News

VOL. 52 ISSUE 28 JULY 14, 2015 P85 Do you think one helps build volume in the other? We've seen it happen, actu- ally. Sometimes you get people coming in through the door to look at an Indian but they're more a modern style person and say "That Magnum, that X1, that's way cool" and they end up going that way. Or in reverse they come in potentially after a Victory, and then find the Indian Dark Horse is a real eye-catcher and Scout of course, now you're starting to see us go to a younger age in demographics. What we're trying to work on is thinking about the Indian brand as one for all ages. There's no reason for us to pigeonhole any particular age group or rider group with Indian. With Victory being more performance fo- cused, I think we can start to get away from age groups. So it's more about how do you use that market—demand way outstrips supply, and we've been working feverishly to meet that demand on Scouts. Are you still working just a single shift at your Spirit Lake factory? We have three assembly lines in Spirit Lake—a separate Chief line, a separate Scout line, and a separate Victory line—and we're working two shifts on each line building Indian product, while on the third line we jump back and forth between Indian and Vic- tory, but still a double shift. One of the great challenges we have at Spirit Lake is that we employ a high percentage of the local working community. So when we look to expand our shifts we have to spread the radius to find people to staff them. We're now running buses from 40 miles out to draw on a further pool of partners. We're running full bore at Spirit Lake. I know Polaris never reveals numbers for motorcycle pro- duction, but with your stated $137.4 million sales in Q1 of 2015, I rationalize that to about 8,000 bikes a quarter, which seems to be a pretty good volume compared to before. Yes, you're close—so we're doing all right! So far all your motorcycles are being built in Spirit Lake, but Polaris Group opened a new factory in Poland last year, and has a new one being built in Huntsville, Alabama. "… INDIAN HAS THE OPPORTUNITY TO GO WHEREVER IT WOULD LIKE TO GO IN TERMS OF PRODUCT. SO I'D LIKE TO SEE INDIAN STRETCHING FAR BEYOND ITS CLASSIC CRUISER HERITAGE, AND GETTING INTO BEING TECHNICALLY INNOVATIVE, AND GOING INTO DIFFERENT MARKET SEGMENTS." that's also way cool. I've seen them switch. Before you launched Indian you told me that you perceived Indian's customer base as being older and more traditionally minded, whereas Victory's was younger and more technology focused. Has that in fact turned out to be the case? Yes and no. What we see is the Touring customer in Indian is a little older than Victory's, but when you look at Dark Horse bike and want to have fun with it, and what does that bike say about you—that counts most. What's driven that steep increase in volume—is it the Scout, or the bigger engined Chief and Chieftain? Both, actually. Our big bikes are growing in volume quite well, but the Scout has really been a game changer for us, even though right now it's only selling about a quarter of what our big bikes are doing. Part of our chal- lenge is getting that product to

• Cover