Harley-Davidson

Harley-Davidson is one of America's most iconic brands. It is also a financial powerhouse. This is not a coincidence. By tapping into a deeply patriotic consumer base and aggressively marketing to new market segments such as women and professionals, Harley-Davidson has adroitly avoided the pitfalls that have beset so much of American industry.

Harley-Davidson has taken a product that for much of the last quarter century had superior foreign competition and crafted a marketing strategy that effectively allowed the company to survive. Harley-Davidson has managed its business so that today the quality of the competition doesn't significantly effect its bottom line. The transformation from cult status to mass-market monster is most impressive because of the almost total absence of brand dilution.

It doesn't make sense that aging Boomers and young punks alike would all look to the same product to validate their existence, yet this is precisely what Harley-Davidson has managed. Sturgis has gone from a rough and tumble biker hangout to an enormous commercial pilgrimage, and none of the core customers seem to mind.

In an era of rising fuel prices and stagnant disposable income with an ever expanding array of competing ways to spend entertainment dollars, Harley-Davidson has convinced Americans of all stripes to throw thousands of dollars at a status symbol that increasingly signifies no particular status. Or maybe that classless sameness is really what Americans have been looking for all along.