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Thread: Polaris to shut down Victory

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    EBRforum Junkie 1190SX's Avatar
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    Well, can't say we didn't see this coming. Indian has way more potential against HD. Now EBR is our only hope for American Sports bikes. Indian and Harley will never break the mold, it would take a near death blow to one of them to consider actually breaking the mold and making something like a sport bike that is light and nimble. Oh well EBR is better anyway.

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    As a long time owner and supporter of Victory, I was quite disappointed to read the news this morning. However, as 1190SX pointed out, not entirely surprised. Owners of the brand have, for years, been begging them to get out of the Bagger/Cruiser genre and finally persue bikes that live up their "Modern American Muscle" marketing. This was amplified exponentially with the Pikes Peak racing and the P156 project. People all over the country wanted them to build a proper, naked streetfighter based on that bike. After a year of nonstop hype, we got the Octane...a warmed over Scout. To say people were disappointed would be the understatement of the year. They kept trying to sell that American Muscle hype, but deep down I think everybody knew it was over. It was difficult enough, the first 15 years, scratching out a niche as the American cruiser alternative in the shadow of HD...that same stategy was never going to survive in the shadow of both HD and Indian.

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    Hate to sound like a hater, but Victory (as it IS) made sense to discontinue. There is no point for any motorcycle company to have two lines of cruisers. It's nothing but internal competition between the two lines... (No ****, I know)...

    Now, if they would have done a better job at differentiating the two lines- Indian as the cruiser marque and Victory as the sporty standard/ naked/ electric/ adventure... well, then that could've been another story. As I've read over and over again, a lot of the Victory supports screamed for that differentiation.

    Sad, really.

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    I always thought Polaris was the ideal parent company for EBR. Hopefully that happens.

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    EBRforum Junkie 1190SX's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Doug Porcaro View Post
    I always thought Polaris was the ideal parent company for EBR. Hopefully that happens.
    Eh, as long as they don't pull an HD move and stifle creativity, which I think they would. The fact that Indian was resurrected again by Polaris only to push out what I will call rebranded Harley Davidsons is a shame. Do you really need to continue making "cruisers" which IMO is a classification of bikes created to excuse not pushing designs or technology advancement? Indian should have come back to kick HD in the pants, make a cutting edge American bike like the guys did in the old days, don't make something that is a retro throw back to the old Indians. Don't get me wrong, the old bikes were great, but they had their day and its time to push the envelope in styling and performance. Lets be honest with ourselves here, do we really believe, that if the guys who were designing Indians or Harleys in the 40's and 50's were alive now they would be making them almost identical to what they were back then? They would look at the cutting edge bikes today, and look at what Harley and Indian continue to push out and say WTF? Why do these companies do this? I can park my 64 Harley next to a new Harley and people cannot tell the difference. That is absurd. Like Erik said, ending the business with HD was a blessing in disguise. The cruiser manufacturers are guilty of being close minded to anything pushing the limits or cutting edge. They are content to keep pushing out the same trash they have been for the past 60 years, yes I am saying that trash hasn't changed much in the last 60 years and I have a 64 Harley. As long as people buy into it, which they do, they will keep making the same trash and we will all be forced to buy Japanese bikes if we want anything lighter than 600lbs that is fast and agile.

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    EBRforum Expert Scott's Avatar
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    Did anyone else get a weird sense of deja vu reading the press release?

    I can't say I blame them for shutting down one cruiser division when they had another cruiser division making nearly identical bikes, but I do blame them for not allowing Victory to morph into something better once they had the Indian brand.

    What they did with the Octane was one of the dumbest, most annoying things I've ever seen in my 40 plus years of following the motorcycle industry. They teased us with the Pikes peak bike and other bits and pieces that convinced the motorcycle world they might create a new, sporty motorcycle... and then they gave us a re-badged Scout.

    I think that was the beginning of the end. If the Octane had been more of an XR1200 - type bike and they had re-themed the brand around that and Brammo, they would have gotten my attention.

    And speaking of Brammo, what's going to happen to their electric bikes? Will they drop them, re-badge them as Polaris, rebadge them as Indian? They could have kept the Victory name and dropped everything but the electrics.

    Well, at least this means less competition for EBR.

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    Yeah, it's definitely been a frustrating few years to be a fan of the brand. Waiting and wading through their nonstop hype over the IoMTT and Pikes Peak efforts. Hoping for them to finally follow through with their promise to build something sport oriented...only to deliver the Octane. I guess the writing really was on the wall at that point.

    Regarding the comment 1190SX made about Cruiser classification, that generally is true when it comes to HD and any competition from the Japanese marques; That it is a lazy classification to avoid developing modern technologies...but to be fair to Victory, they really were the brand that was ahead of the curve in that regard. They actually were innovative. They actually did push the boundaries. They produced an overhead cam v-twin with Peterbilt like durability. They produced a touring bike (Vision) that, to this day, owners swear is the best touring chassis ever produced...albeit a bit of an odd looking thing. There are several members of our owners club that have well over 100,000 miles on factory stock Vic's. I owned my first Victory for 10 years and never purchased anything more than oil, tires, brakes and batteries. They developed the boxed aluminum frame, a first for an American cruiser or Touring bike, that is the very foundation of the current Indian lineup. Then they just stopped right around 2010-2011 (right around where I imagine the board room discussions about purchasing Indian began). They haven't released a "new" bike, really, since 2010 when the Cross platform was revealed. Every bike since then - Boardwalk, Judge, Highball, Gunner, Cross Country Tour, Magnum, X1 - are all based on either the existing Vegas platform or the Cross platform. The only truly new bike was the Octane, and that's just a warmed over Scout.
    Last edited by Led Boots; 01-10-2017 at 10:08 AM.

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    EBRforum Expert Scott's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Led Boots View Post
    Yeah, it's definitely been a frustrating few years to be a fan of the brand. Waiting and wading through their nonstop hype over the IoMTT and Pikes Peak efforts. Hoping for them to finally follow through with their promise to build something sport oriented...only to deliver the Octane. I guess the writing really was on the wall at that point.

    Regarding the comment 1190SX made about Cruiser classification, that generally is true when it comes to HD and any competition from the Japanese marques; That it is a lazy classification to avoid developing modern technologies...but to be fair to Victory, they really were the brand that was ahead of the curve in that regard. They actually were innovative. They actually did push the boundaries. They produced an overhead cam v-twin with Peterbilt like durability. They produced a touring bike (Vision) that, to this day, owners swear is the best touring chassis ever produced...albeit a bit of an odd looking thing. There are several members of our owners club that have well over 100,000 miles on factory stock Vic's. I owned my first Victory for 10 years and never purchased anything more than oil, tires, brakes and batteries. They developed the boxed aluminum frame, a first for an American cruiser or Touring bike, that is the very foundation of the current Indian lineup. Then they just stopped right around 2010-2011 (right around where I imagine the board room discussions about purchasing Indian began). They haven't released a "new" bike, really, since 2010 when the Cross platform was revealed. Every bike since then - Boardwalk, Judge, Highball, Gunner, Cross Country Tour, Magnum, X1 - are all based on either the existing Vegas platform or the Cross platform. The only truly new bike was the Octane, and that's just a warmed over Scout.
    I find myself wondering if the design and engineering people were battling the the bean-counters. When they created Indian, they didn't just plop the Victory engine in there as I might have imagined, but created a new (and by all accounts very good) engine.

    That along with the Scout when it arrived seemed to indicate that they were willing to invest to make truly different bikes and not just play the badge game, and if they had continued that route, they might have really had something. But then the Octane came along and burst that bubble.

    I wonder if at some point the plan was to make Victory and the Octane more unique, but the accountants convinced upper management it would make more sense to keep costs low by sharing bikes across brands.

    I've always been a firm believer that when the accountants start taking charge any brand will suffer and whither until the people who actually like and understand the product (as opposed to people who just focus on the bottom line) are put back in control.
    Last edited by Scott; 01-10-2017 at 11:07 AM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Scott View Post
    I find myself wondering if the design and engineering people were battling the the bean-counters. When they created Indian, they didn't just plop the Victory engine in there as I might have imagined, but created a new (and by all accounts very good) engine.

    That along with the Scout when it arrived seemed to indicate that they were willing to invest to make truly different bikes and not just play the badge game, and if they had continued that route, they might have really had something. But then the Octane came along and burst that bubble.

    I wonder if at some point the plan was to make Victory and the Octane more unique, but the accountants convinced upper management it would make more sense to keep costs low by sharing bikes across brands.

    I've always been a firm believer that when the accountants start taking charge any brand will suffer and whither until the people who actually like and understand the product (as opposed to people who just focus on the bottom line) are put back in control.
    Yeah, that very well could be what happened. Hindsight being what it is, you can almost see that playing out in how the past few years have gone. I also think there may have been some division in loyalty in the boardroom between the two brands. Before the Indian acquisition, Victory was everybody's focus. Decisions were made with 100% focus on the best interest for that marque. Indian enters the picture and that wasn't the case anymore. Human nature is going to take over and people are going to pick sides. It really is a shame because Victory had so much potential to do so much more, but once Indian became the new kid on campus they were relegated to an afterthought amongst their own company.

    On the Victory FB page, somebody asked about rebranding current Victory models, etc. The admin responded that "...all Victory patents, technologies, and intellectual property remain the property of Polaris and will be utilized across Polaris platforms as appropriate". I hope that's true. Not so much rebranding existing vehicles, but carry the innovation and technology on with the Indian name. American motorcycles, and specifically Indian, does not need to be defined by a pushrod v-twin that looks like it was designed in the 40s.

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