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JW381
1/16/2018 4:45pm
1/16/2018 4:45pm
Edited Date/Time
1/17/2018 3:12pm
Does anyone have some educated info as to what it costs the OEMs to make the bikes we buy and ride? Excluding R&D. How much is done in house and how much is outsourced (i.e. bars, tires, rims, exhaust etc.)? Assuming a roughly 50% margin we're looking at ~4-5k? But what about shipping costs, is that factored in? Would the answer surprise me, more like 2500?
What I'd really be interested in, is how the number you're asking for differs from say the Honda's and Yamaha's of the world, to the Beta, Sherco and TM's of the world. On one hand, the smaller OEMs have way less overhead expense; but on the other hand I'm not sure how much they lose out on economies of scale...
The Shop
$10k sitting on the dealer floor, the unit cost was probably around $2k.
That's what I was told, don't know if it's true...true back then or true now...Who really knows?
I also watched a YouTube vid on KHI and it was talking about their parts delivery system. They dont get the parts for what they are working on until just before assembly. Thought that was pretty cool and efficient rather than having massive warehouses stocking every little item needed to complete a bike.
What would really make people scratch their heads is what an OEM pays for tires, bars, rims, grips...etc. But, then you have to factor in that they're buying them by the THOUSANDS.
$80 handlebars for $16? Sure! (When you buy 5,000 at a time & they ship in a giant container...not one at a time)
Pit Row
KTM would have a good idea, as well as any of the other smaller, dirtbike-only manufacturers. One thing to note though, is that the smaller guys are going to have higher production costs, and way less marketing overhead, so they may not be comparable to Japanese bikes.
Even at GM, they have trouble evaluating costs for individual car models. Marketing is one of the hardest entities to account for, something that has very little to do with the actual manufacturing, but has a lot to do with the final price of product.
But a pure manufacturing product cost is usually 4X mark up.
For example, doesn't Pro-X supply a lot of OEMs with parts??
I ordered an 07'CR125 OEM cylinder Horrible void/casting flaw.
Had I been afforded the opportunity to inspect the cylinder firsthand prior to purchase, I'd have declined. Looks like a crack. Check it out.
Here is a pic:
EDIT: Also, more and more OEM Honda "Nuts and Bolts" are labeled U.S.A., not Japan. Good or bad? Time will tell. OEM Japanese stuff was really durable.
Removed seller reference to let them have more time to sort it out.
From what I understand, Pro X sells a fair amount of OEM parts in Pro X packaging. Usually Pro X is good stuff, but like anything, check it out first.
Just a thought, I'm far (read: very far) from an expert on this, but I do have a little bit of knowledge on this.
I did see in another article that in 2014, Harley Davidson earned 39% gross profit margin on their motorcycle line... so their cost for every $10,000 Harley was $6,100.
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