Harley Davidson case study

Résumé du document

Harley Davidson, more than a simple motorcycle brand, is a real religion, with its fervent passionate riders. Talking about Harley Davidson, it's talking about a living myth, about a strong community sharing American values such as patriotism and freedom. It's talking about a chosen way of live!
One of the main events organized by the brand is the Posse Ride, which has more and more followers wanting to be part of it.

The Posse Ride is a real challenge for bikers, an adventure to share with fellow over the country. It's being part of the History! For very many participants, the Posse Ride is a real pride, the best way to close strong friendship with people sharing your values and way of thinking freedom.
More than a personal challenge, it's a huge human adventure in which you have the advantaged opportunity to share points of view and experiences with very many Harley Davidson fellows.

Our main objectives are to make the Posse Ride be an unavoidable event for Harley Davidson bikers.
To do so, we want to improve it so as to enhance its community links and the Harley Davidson spirit with the ride! The aim of the Posse Ride will be to increase strongly and durably the loyalty of the bikers as to the ride as to the brand.

Extraits

[...] Actually, HOG should create a “fans of Harley Davidson” blog. In this case, passionate people should be able to share their experiences, remind some souvenirs, find people they appreciated during further rallies recommend some new products and really blend in a solid and coherent community. Participants could download some pictures or movies of their rallies' experiences and comment them, provoking some reactions from others or reminding some common souvenirs. Also, HOG would be able to communicate through the blog, by sending invitations to special events such as inauguration, and to rallies, to edit some details about new products through newsletter or advertisements to intervene in consumers' discussions and answer consumers' specific requests. [...]

[...] In addition, the dealers they meet all over the trip are very independent from the Harley Davidson Company. As a consequence, their involvement in the road theme depends a lot on their personality. This could be a problem for the global coherence and the own image of the brand, and it could damage the ride spirit. Fortunately, the Posse Ride has very strong links with its customers. Indeed, moreover than the very high loyalty of HOG members over the brand, the riders share a very important pride of doing that ride which represents for them a huge personal challenge. [...]

[...] And this phenomenon is particularly enhanced in the Posse Ride, due to the complexity and the spontaneity of the event. While facing difficulties, people tend to get closer to each other and to really stand together. Consequently, in terms of value and in terms of consistency with the consumers' spirits and expectations from Harley Davidson, this event greatly responds to the criteria. Moreover, it strongly contributes to the constitution of a strong Harley Davidson community. The Posse Ride is also a flexible way to meet Harley Davidson dealers, and display them to Harley Davidson communitarians. [...]

[...] Thus, women should assume the fact that they enjoy the free spirited brand and HOG would attract or at least sensibilize some more different population to its group, and then to the events. Last, but not least, given that Destination Rallies are extremely labor extensive to produce and very expensive to organize, HOG should suppress one of those rallies, in order to focus much more on rolling rallies and set more money on them. Bibliographie indicative L'Epopée Harley-Davidson Saladini Albert Harley Davidson. [...]

[...] Effectively, in its essence, the Posse Ride is a spontaneous ride, from US Border to Border, which has a strong epic quality, contrarily to stationary rallies. Consequently, the highlighted values are freedom, adventure, challenge (to find the right route, to go through obstacles and daily difficulties), sensations, discoveries and friendships. The spontaneous aspect of the trip provides strong feelings of adventure, exploration and more of all, it gives a sensation of power to the bikers. They can dominate the road, its complexities, cross the entire USA and conquest it. And fundamentally, Harley Davidson consumers/ bikers desire to personify those values. [...]