Online motorcycle sales improve motorcycle quality

Ebay Motors makes motorcycles better! How do they do that? Think about it. When you stroll into your local dealer looking at all of the jazzy new models, you consider everything, how it looks, how it handles, horsepower, speed, you know, all of the important things that get your juices flowing. Then you look at the price tag and wonder if your wallet can handle it. But it’s not as simple as stroking a check or getting a loan, if you figure you’ll eventually want to sell it sometime down the road, how much you can get out of it then, might make or break the sale.

Back in the old days (pre-computer, that is), when time came to sell, you might try trading at the dealer or you put an ad in the local paper and if someone in your town was looking for an 87 Yamazuki Speedliner, you were in luck, but what if no one was, and both of your two calls offered you $150? You could advertise in Cycle News or one of the other print mags but quite often, someone who might buy your bike instantly wouldn’t know it was for sale. Hmm…

Enter ebay. Now, your bike is out there for everyone to see and bikers everywhere get to bid which helps drive up the sales price, but something else happens, too. Maybe you learned over the years that 87 Yamazukis had problems with overheating or cracked blocks, something a casual buyer might not know. Online, everyone knows so bikes with a bad reputation for quality or reliability still sell cheap and bikes that last, hold their resale value.

The fake shortage disappears, too. Used to be, someone could say his bike was really rare and you had no way to know. Online, twenty five are available right now, … not so rare. New model dealer markup is less, too. Ford GTs are running into that now, the first buyers were paying huge dollars, now there’s a site that tracks available GTs and selling prices.

Manufacturers, at least the smart ones, realize that better quality leads to higher resale. You might spend more upfront because you know you’ll get it back later, at least some of it, and the real cost may be less for a more expensive bike. Online, the real quality bikes become well known, and no marketing hype can buy that. Kinda cool. Buy a cheapie up front and it becomes disposable because no one will buy it next year. Isn’t it neat how things work out and something like online sales affects quality on the production line? I like it.

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