WHERE ARE THEY?

[GUZZI JOHN]

 Considering the huge member list not much happens here. Perhaps it is dying like the Motorcycle industry. My buddy who owns the Anoka Cycleshop says his business is way down. He also works in repossession of closing dealerships nationwide many of which are going under. Maybe it is generational as the young folks are hooked on their phones and the Baby Boomers are trying to sell their Hoglies. I still get out at least weekly for 50-150 milers. Hopefully many others do too.

[vince]

A friend on mine is saying just the opposite. Yes there are shops going under. There always will be. But of last Saturday he told me he was so busy selling bikes that after he closes the doors. He is still there for an hour doing paper work for selling all the bikes. He says sales are up more than 20%. Another thing he pointed out was that young people are coming in and buying. He says this is just great. Lots of good deals on non-current bikes. I saw 2017-19 bikes on the floor. For me it was hard to walk out the door without buying a new bike.

[Deplorable, thank you!]

 Well the member list has been an inflated list for years, atleast 75% of the list has never made a single post nor have they logged in in the past several years, many never since creating the account

There are really only 20 maybe 30 on a good season "active" members and it has really been this way for a decade or more... (same as most every forum out there)

 As far as the industry goes;

 I have been as busy as ever and still turn away more customers than I can take in by atleast 3 turned away to every 1 I can take in margin...... But, I am service only end, so not an accurate representation of the market as a whole......
 the dealerships I get my oem parts from; one is expanding and adding another line, another recently re-did their entire floor and seems to be thriving as well. I see "hiring" signs at them often

 Are their issues in the industry, of course there are.....is the industry dying just because the youth of today would rather play with their xbox controller than go out in the real world and experience mother nature and conquer some of it........ Dying no, slowed growth or gone stagnant I believe so

 Bike prices are high and there are so many idgits on the roads not paying attention so people are afraid of being killed/run over etc...... are just two of the reasons I hear often why people either rarely ride or don't ride at all. Lots of those people say they want to ride just don't feel it is "safe"

 Lots of sunny weather Sunday only riders that log 1000 miles or less annually (state stats says the average is only about 1200 miles annually) - we should all work to change that stat!

 plenty of my customers only really ride with the group of people that perhaps they call "friends" or atleast are thier 'riding buddies' and when those people have family issues or financial issues or move or job stuff it can affect the entire group and their riding can suffer as a result......... I have several customers who used to have people to ride with one evening every week or every weekend but when that changed they now ride far less and some barely ride at all without that dynamic in their lives......

[Elk]

He says sales are up more than 20%. 

What bikes are selling? 

And what are the younger riders buying?

[vince]

They sale Honda, Suzuki, Yamaha, Huski, and KTM. I guess what aren't they buying.

[pkpk]

Several years ago, I started a thread that was strictly focused on motorcycle accidents from stats published by the State Patrol.  It was simply a thread to show riders how accidents occur and convey the message about proper training.  I posted these stats for almost a whole season and was shocked how large the thread view count had grown, (132,250 as indicated today).  I suspect the member list might have grown from people who don't even ride and were drawn by the tragedy factor of that thread  I discontinued the practice as these stats are already public on the State Patrol site anyway.

[Greg]

Several years ago, I started a thread that was strictly focused on motorcycle accidents from stats published by the State Patrol.  It was simply a thread to show riders how accidents occur and convey the message about proper training.  I posted these stats for almost a whole season and was shocked how large the thread view count had grown, (132,250 as indicated today).  I suspect the member list might have grown from people who don't even ride and were drawn by the tragedy factor of that thread  I discontinued the practice as these stats are already public on the State Patrol site anyway.

Bots come in and out of "unsafe" websites like this one. That view count is hard to believe without mechanical involvement of some kind. FYI: Check if a site's connection is secure
To see whether a website is safe to visit, you can check for security info about the site. Chrome will alert you if you can’t visit the site safely or privately.

In Chrome, open a page.
To check a site's security, to the left of the web address, look at the security status:
Lock Secure
View site information Info or Not secure
Dangerous Not secure or Dangerous
To see the site's details and permissions, select the icon. You'll see a summary of how private Chrome thinks the connection is.

[Deplorable, thank you!]

^ So you are saying this site is "not secure" with a red exclamation point next to it and the words "NOT SECURE" (when I look next to the address.)
...

 But I do agree, tons and tons of bots crawling the internets skew the viewing numbers


 Hell there are days I get over 1000 hits to my own website, but most days ..... well my average per day since opeing it in 2010? is 21 views per day with 14 of those being direct link (they physically typed in my correct website address or went to it via their own saved pages)- so to me I look at is as I have about 14 real visitor to the site each day averaging 3 minutes per ........ I can live with that

 Further analysis; On every day I add new posts or pictures that goes up to an average of 186 views that day with 42 of those being direct link (those 42 have an average on site time of 9 minutes and view on average 14 pages)........... I only have and keep about 70 members on the site- all inactive members/non memebers with a screen name get the boot within a few months, so I know it is scrolling bots...or a shit ton of joe schmo from the public can see all but 3 pages, so they could be looking via that way
but when average time on the site is less than 1 minute........ nope they looked at nothing, simply found the home page and left

hell many of those huge days I will actually go in and source how they got to my page and track their IP and location and more than 1/2 are from overseas and were indirectly directly to my site

 So one could, if so inclined..... I am sure, one could view the source of every hit, look at the time they spend and even what they looked at while on plus, where they came from and where the IP address is from........... but you'd have to be pretty bored IMO- I generally only do that shit in the winter when I am bored off my ass and making changes to the site etc...

be careful, big brother is watching you and recording you....

[GUZZI JOHN]

 Just a tidbit-yesterday was reading about hoglie's situation. The article was about their in house financing. But the kicker is that they have $20,000,000 in repoed bikes on hand.

[Elk]

They sale Honda, Suzuki, Yamaha, Huski, and KTM. I guess what aren't they buying.

Thanks.
Certainly a good mix.
I hope sales remain up.