Indian

[Old Ryder]

My best bud is a director at Polaris; it's interesting that you think they were making money on Victory, as he's told me for awhile they weren't. I guess you would know more than he does; after all, you owned 2 of them...

Yea--I owned 2 of them and was on the forums and talked to the guys at Daytona every year. May have even talked to your buddy, you never know. BTW---did you ever own or ride a Victory? Just curious. If you had, I think your view would be different.

It was easy to see after the purchase of Indian that all of the focus and attention was going somewhere else. Again, no support from Polaris. All of the Cross bikes AND steel frame bikes got their choice of 1 single backrest and luggage rack from Victory and the Cross bike were about 1K for the combo. It was left up to Witchdoctor and other aftermarket companies to give owners what they wanted and needed---Polaris wasn't gonna do it! Now, you can outfit an Indian Scout 50 different ways with ALL Polaris parts---bars, seats, bags with fringe and bags without fringe hard and leather--take your choice. Then you get into the Chief models and the choices explode. I remember when Victory dropped the Kingpin and started with the new Boardwalk----same bike with different tins. Now that is real promotion.




When you buddy said they lost money the last few years, he was probably correct in that Victory offered nothing and current lines were left to die on the vine---UNLIKE INDIAN. It is more about where you put your effort and energies. They can't build Indians fast enough and the factory can only make so many bikes per year---- I get it! That still don't make it right to the guys that owned them. Of course if you never owned one, you could never relate. JMHO as always.