Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
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INTERVIEW POLARIS' VICE PRESIDENT OF MOTORCYCLES STEVE MENNETO P92 the factory if we build that side of the business up too much right now. Our Spirit Lake factory is pumping out bikes as fast as it can, while still main- taining the high quality levels customers associ- ate with our products. As I said earlier, we're trying to increase num- bers coming off the assembly lines, especially of the Scout. We have the capability already pre- planned in on the cus- tomization side—just not for today right now, but very soon in the future. They'll come further down the line when we've essentially caught up with the volumes of the standard motorcycles that people are ordering. Are there any overseas markets that you have not yet gone into that you would consider to be a potentially profitable area for Victory, or Indian? Japan is the big one, and it's just a recent development. We took Victory there last March of 2014 and Indian went in just this year. We go direct to dealers in selling Indian and Victory in Japan, and we've appointed new Victory dealers there and now we're adding new Indian dealers. How about South East Asia, where last year Ducati sold more motorcycles in Thailand then in the UK—their third big- gest market in Europe! I think there's a great oppor- tunity in a lot of different markets that we don't play in currently, and Southeast Asia is one of them. We need to be there, and our team is working on plans to do that, same as in Brazil, India, China and so on. We're in some of those places, but not yet at the level that we want to be. But we're aware that Harley-David- son has an extremely successful global distribution, and that's our goal, too. Most of the European man- ufacturers have established CKD assembly plants in South East Asia or in South America (and especially Brazil), to overcome import duties for fully built-up vehicles. Will you do the same? We are looking at that. We clearly understand the benefits of minimiz- ing duties in this way with bikes that are still manufactured in the U.S. But as we go forward and expand our motorcy- cle opportunity we know that there are going to be different ways to go in manufacturing—maybe not with the particular brands that we own right now. So not with the Indian or Victory brands, but maybe with a future brand we might acquire where we look at how that could play as we explore different segments. But I think we will have motorcycle manufacturing outside the U.S. as we grow our overall motorcycle business. Final question: when can I buy a Victory Core? You too, huh? What a bike! The Core is actually the pre- design of what's gone into the Cross models and the Vision and so forth, but everyone wants that Core. "Why don't you guys make that?" is the question I get asked most after whether Indian is going racing. I'm interested in producing it, because it says a lot about the Victory brand from a marketing perspective, so I've got the team looking at doing that. Are we going to build the Core? We're trying really hard to figure out a way… CN Menneto was presented with the Industry Leader of the Year award at the 2014 V-Twin Expo.