Harley Davidson Case Study - How A Cult Brand Was Made - A Case Study for Entrepreneurs

Hello friends, welcome back this week, I'm Harley-Davidson, the amazing American motorcycle and fashion

brand

, and we're going to take a look at point 1 of what makes a

brand

a

cult

brand with such a huge following. Harley-Davidson is one of the few

cult

brands. brands in the world and let's take a look at that, the other thing I like to see this week, point two, is feeding the customer. Harley-dav through his ups and downs did a great job of feeding the customer what they wanted. Let's first take a tour of the origins and growth of Harley-Davidson and see what happened and how it built motorcycles and became the cult brand it is today.

I won't spend much time on the story, but there are some very interesting things. curiosities that show you the roots of the company and how they were built in 1901, a young man named William Harley, who is like any young man who thinks about things in the future and what would be interesting, makes a small sketch of a motorcycle. It was a bicycle with a motor and you didn't have to pedal it, which would become what we now know as the motorcycle and in 1901 he was drawing it and imagining where he would go with it and in 1903, about a year and a half later.

It was his friend Arthur Davidson who joined him and they built the Harley-Davidson engine company in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and they had a little 10t x 15 15 foot wooden shed and that's where they built their first motorcycles, by the way, in 2014, one of those early motorcycles and there is dispute about whether it was the second serial number, the third serial number, but one of those real Circa Harley-Davidson motorcycles from early 1903 sold for $15 million at a collectors auction , so if you have an old Harley somewhere in your garage, you might want to check it out. Take it out because if it's a really old one that your great-grandfather had, you might not have to work anymore, so dust that thing off and take it to an auction so they can move on and what's also very interesting in June of 1903 and this would close the circle 100 years later, Ford Motor Company was born in Dearborn, Michigan, so having two unique American transportation brands, Ford and Harley, literally built and born around the same time, just shows the advancement that was coming to America at that time. moment.

With their entrepreneurial spirit, in 1904, after the birth of the motorcycle, the first dealership came and a dealership in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, sold some of the first production bikes, which they

made

again and again. and once again we sold to the public not only the first ones in 1904, the first one was sold to the public by CH Lang, who is a legend in the history of Harley-Davidson, in Chicago, Illinois. Well, they progressed quite quickly and in 1909 the first vwin was seen. and now you look at Harleys everywhere and you can see that v twin that dates back to 1909, today they are much more advanced of course, but at that time the iconic shape of the engine and all those cooling fins that we see and I think It is a Harley engine that was launched in 1909 1910, they registered the logo of The Familiar.

In reality, this is not something that a modern brand expert has done. Harley did it and they did it in 1910 and registered it. It's been disguised a bit, but not really. Not much has changed since that time. By the way, in 1914, the first motorcycle helmet was not introduced by Harley-Davidson, but by a doctor who watched motorcycle races and saw people crash and get seriously injured, and came up with a way to take it. a little canvas and shellac and make little more than an eggshell that you would use but nevertheless, another businessman sees the result of motorcycle racing and the helmet is born in 197 17 the worlds in World War I and a third Of all Harley-Davidsons manufactured were sold to the military as an efficient way to attract messengers and people and it is not the last time you see guys with guns on motorcycles. 1920 Harley is officially the largest motorcycle company in the world.

Imitators were emerging, but Harley was number one in the largest and by the way, at that time they had 2,000 dealers in 67 countries, it was only 1,903, so this is 17 years later, it's global at a time when you know shipping was done by ship, so that's a pretty amazing feat. Also that year, the pig. came on the scene now, if you know anything about Harley, you know they are called pigs a lot of times they call them a pig and where it came from was this famous Harley racer would win a race and then he would pick up this little pig and he takes a little pig in Victory's lap, a little pig and that's why it became known as the little pig and that's why Harley became known as a pig, so that's where that little nickname came from and I'll tell you a little bit later what people think. came, but it doesn't, it started with that little pig in victory laps after an early Harley enthusiast and accomplished racer won, there you go, it's crazy isn't it?

In 1928 the twin camera came out and you know they continued. grow and be successful and be an incredible company and the interesting thing about 1928 I mention because that double cam, that double cam Harley 1928 had a top speed of just over 100 miles per hour, which was the absolute maximum. flat top speed of 100 miles per hour this is 1928 you are on a motorcycle going 100 miles per hour friends the roads were not paved in America like they are now and you are on a motorcycle on those early American roads going 100m an hour there is only one word for that and it's damn fast, by the way, that year at the Indianapolis 500, the fastest car in the race was 122 miles per hour on a race track, so that shows you that the motorcycle and everything Harley was and they were racing and they were all freedom and excitement, but it was all coming together.

It would continue to grow and in 1941 we had World War II and all civilian bicycle production stopped because they were again building motorcycles for the US Army which were used for messengers and other duty patrols and all because it was a means of very effective transportation now in 1947, you know, World War II is about to start and the first motorcycle jacket is sold, so the first Harley. apparel we move to 1954, when they had a little setback, they were accused of restrictive business practices and they started to see a setback in their growth and it was because they really lost a step and what they did was, uh, there was cheaper, uh. motorcycles that came from other parts of the world and they didn't like that, they didn't like the fact that there were Japanese motorcycles coming ashore and they tried to restrict it with Say Hey, they put a big tariff on them, uh and and that.

It really wasn't the way to do it because freedom and free enterprise around the world, regardless of how you feel certain governments do and don't do business, in my opinion, Harley

made

a mistake and a lot of people thought they made a mistake. and they wanted this tariff and they were told no, that was not going to happen, so they blocked it, they continued to grow but they stumbled and 14 years later, in 1969, believe it or not, this wonderful, incredible company almost went bankrupt and then AMF , which is still standing. For American Machine and Foundry, which was a sports and enthusiast brand in America, they built a lot of things, they bought Harley-Davidson and started trying to make a profit, but without focusing on the product and They cut people, they reduced size and, before Before you know it, not only were they a struggling company, but the quality and performance of the bikes declined and the once proud brand became tarnished and, believe it or not, in the early '70s, the little Harley-Davidson nickname.

Among the people it wasn't very friendly and it was hard to ride it wasn't Harley-Davidson it was hard to ride you bought a Harley why would you do that it's hard to ride why don't you buy a Honda Honda motorcycles were known as cheap, light and efficient and They did not break this competition so suddenly and the purchase by AMF leads to this terrible chapter in the life of the company, within the company there were men who had a beating heart for the origin of Harley, they really wanted to see it return and 13 The Highs executives in 1981 along with Willie Davidson, who is a descendant of the original founder of uh, they got together and they went to AMF and they bought the company back from AMF in 1981 and they had this rallying cry, they said only the Soares eagle can be seen on Some From the Harley-Davidson logos you will see these eagle wings.

Well, it was just eagle sores and we're coming back, so here comes Harley coming back now if you really want to read Harley's long history there. There have been many books written that tell you all the finer points and I've skipped a lot of them because what's really important is that we got to the point where the men who were passionate about the brand wanted to see it recover and SAR to new heights, well, they started thinking about the customer and in 1983 they formed hog, which stands for Harley Owners Group, and they took that original motorcycle nickname, the hog, which went back to the guy who won races and would take a pig in a victory lamp and they said and now we have to get back to what our brand stood for when we were originally born we were winning races we were building cool bikes we were motorcycle innovators people loved riding a Harley Because it was the first and it was iconic and we had the first V-twin engine and everyone these advances and then we lost our way in the 50s and 60s and almost went bankrupt, we have to go back and think about all those things that they did Us, great, well the 80s and 90s saw them stumble here and there, but they managed to get back get it back on track and, in 1986, they took it out on the stock market, so they went back there and there's something very interesting about 198 7, right?

After going on the stock market, the average income of a Harley-Davidson rider was $38,000 now, let's look at this 10 years later, the income had more than doubled to $83,000 in 1997, now I'm sure that there's inflation and the dollar would go up and stuff, but The point was that Harleys were being bought by more upscale people and if you think back to 1996, someone who was born in the early '60s is now 35 years old and they're going back to their roots and buying these Harleys that were bigger and had the familiar sound. and it had all this style associated with them, uh, and that was really something that you look at and you see the genius of the guys who brought back the brand at the same time they brought back the bikes, better bikes, better quality, feed into the ownership group. things that matter to them and allowed the brand to rise well in 2003, something interesting happened that Ford Motor Company remembers what Ford talked about, so it's the centennial in 2003, they celebrated the centennial with a special edition of the Ford F-truck 150 with the brand.

Harley-Davidson now looks at this four years earlier, in 1999, the entire world and the automotive community was like what was happening because Harley and Ford announced that there would be the debut of the Ford F-150 in 1999 of the Harley-Davidson version of the Ford F-150 was black, it had Chrome, it had the

harley

davidson

letters on the back of the truck, it had the Harley, you know, the eagle icon, the silhouette of the brand on the hubcaps and everyone in the automotive world says Let them wait a minute. more trucks, you're branding them for a motorcycle brand and Ford said we want Harley owners to come to Ford and we want to show them a version of the truck so that when they haul things because a Harley is a pleasure vehicle, obviously not It's a full-time vehicle that works 7 days a week, so we want to get to the essence of the Harley brand and translate it to the F-150 to tip our hats and show our love to those owners and Guess what worked, they sold a lot of these and in 2003 there was a special marketing campaign between Ford and Harley that turned 100 years together, so a couple of iconic brands in the United States came together, but with the most iconic of all, Harley-Davidson and symbol of freedom, power and expression on the motorcycle and when you say iconic it means that it is the brand that everyone looks at, it is the symbol that everyone looks at and everything that it is defines it as if people said that that guy is the Babe Ruth of tennis.

Because Babe Ruth was the iconic example of the guy who dominated everyone. He is the Babe Ruth of football. Well, there is no other Harley-Davidson, there is only one Harley-Davidson of motorcycles and it is the iconic Harley brand, something so interesting. We are focusing on all this branding and accessories and in 2005, Harley-Davidson accessories to dress up your motorcycle and clothing cross a quarter of a billion dollars. Now not all of that quarter billion was clothing, but it shows you that in addition to selling motorcycles, a billion dollars. There were dollars in these accessories, clothing and brands and we saw Harley-Davidson cafes emerge.

There is an amazing Harley-Davidson restaurant in Las Vegas that you can go to and it is similar to the Hard Rock Café in that it celebrates everything that is Harley, but it is a restaurant and it is the Harley brand, so in the mid 2000s the brand Harley had made a full recovery and had achieved cult status to the point that in 2006 management made a simple decision, they called Wall Street and said: you know Harley-Davidson. Built-in HDI, our stock symbol, yes, change it, we want it to be a pigbecause we care about the owner, so the final step is that the Harley-Davidson stock symbol is now a pig going back to that pig on a victory lap and, more importantly, the Harley Owners Group and all about the brand that those men who took that AMF company back instilled in them to be the cult brand and even have a cult stock symbol, now let's talk about aA little about cult brands What makes a cult brand not Start by saying: Tomorrow I will be a cult brand.

It takes time to build that up, but let's look at what's in it and there are about seven principles that fall into many places. There's a great website called cult brand that talks about a lot of these same principles of what constitutes a cult brand and the first thing I want to get at is that a cult brand, first and foremost, is different because people want to be different to you. don't buy certain fashion brands or Air Jordans because you want to be the same, you buy them because you want to be different and you think it represents you whether it's an athlete and just do it like Nike or like Harley power Freedom individual expression So the first thing is that the brands cult motorcycles are different, there are real differences in their essence, the second thing is that generally there is courage and that courage is seen in the founder or in the people who built the brand and, certainly, you could see that Harley and Davidson were building motorcycles of careers. at a time when many of the roads were hardly paved and then you could see the courage and novelty that was in the founders that comes through the motorcycle and its brand today, finally, fun and expression.

I think that's simple, Harley-Davidson. It seems funny how many times you watch a movie and you see a Harley-Davidson, you see it racing down the road and you say man that looks funny and I don't even ride a motorcycle, then you listen, you know they listen and they let the evangelists hear the crowd, They hear the cheers of people who love their brand and you know what they do with that, they feed it, but they listen and allow evangelists to be born. Now Harley-Davidson has had some negative aspects with Evangelista is when the Hells Angels are associated with Harley-Davidson, but today the icons and the people who write Harley-Davidson come from you, you know it's more of a rock image and roll, but they listen and allow themselves to believe they are evangelists. then it is tribal, it creates true communities.

I'm a big fan of the Oakland Raiders and when I see people on the street wearing a Raider hat or jersey, I look at them and I'm going to Raider Nation, honey, do you know what they are? They will tell me right away that they are going to Raider Nation and that is because I am part of the cult brand that is the Oakland Raiders. I like my Raiders and I meet people and just Raider Nation baby is similar to Harley. Davidson, that's one of the things about a cult brand is the tribal nature: you see someone, you say hello, and they say hello back.

It's a tribe where everyone is a part of it and knows what it means, even if they just met on the street and are just giving thumbs up back and forth the last thing is inclusion openness openness is inclusive hey, if you get on on a Harley or you get on the team, we will welcome you, you have to be authentic and yet you can't be silly, but openness and inviting others to join the tribe is also the essence of the cult brand and Lastly, freedom cult brands are invariably about freedom, the freedom to express the freedom to do so, and most importantly, within freedom is Cult brands gain power from their enemies.

You can take my har, but you can't take my freedom. The haters make everyone in the tribe, the Evangelist, those who are expressing, come together and defend the brand when you think of Harley and think. about people criticizing loud motorcycles, you will see Harley owners coming together again, what are you talking about? What are you talking about? They're no more or less loud than a lot of other things and other sports cars and things like this. that from you they unite and defend the brand and draw power from their enemies and detractors because when there is criticism you are basically saying that you are different when you receive criticism from people who greet or are part of a brand or adopt that brand guess what you're saying now that you're different and that's exactly what part of being in the community is about for the haters to validate the difference and bring people together and the cult brand and standing up for it all comes together And I think when you look at these criteria, Harley -Davidson meets each of them.

How are you doing? They are doing very well. They have had their ups and downs, but today they exceed $6 billion in annual sales. 19 a little bit after the 1990s in the mid 90s they hit $1 billion they had a little setback in 2009 but their history has been known for setbacks but they have always recovered so the stock market maybe not may have liked it too much and criticized them, but the owners who were enjoying the new and reliable advanced versions of the legendary Harley-Davidson motorcycle expressed in the technology of today's motorcycles with The Branding that dates back a long time, to those People are not bothered by a stock problem, that's not what it's about, that's what it's about. be a part of the Harley-Davidson brand, so here's hoping that your brand or what you are associated with one day becomes a cult brand because it is an unbreakable bond between you and your customer.

This week's two points are what turns a brand into a cult. brand and we talk about the points that make it because Harley-Davidson let me tell you they don't sell motorcycles Harley-Davidson sells admission to the badass club, whether you ride Harley gear or are on a Harley bike, everyone in it you are part of that club, part of that nation that is Harley-Davidson and the second feeds the customer when those men bought back the company, they gave the customer better quality bikes, more advanced technology in the bikes and what's more Importantly, I created the Harley Owners Group that said it's all about you and I'm going to give it to you and I'm going to give you more of what you love at Harley.

Do we have a black pillow? Do we have like a black? Know? what we need we need a black pillow with chrome is what we need for this week anyway subscribe to Value tainment this is the best channel on the internet for

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and all the topics that will help you take your business to the next level in your life as an entrepreneur until next time I'm Tom Ellsworth and I hope to love you better than I found you