Ever get caught riding into a rain storm? I know I have and if you packed the right gear and ride carefully you’ll be fine… otherwise, prepare to get very, very wet. Storm clouds are ahead, better put on that rain gear now!
Before we get to that, HAPPY NEW YEAR, it’s been quite the quick year for me, how about yourself? Seems we were just celebrating New Years 2024 and now we will be tipping the glass to 2025! And now I and Total Motorcycle moves into our 26th year after celebrating TMW’s Quarter Century Anniversary. Wow, how time flies!!
Welcome to our special Total Motorcycle Year End Review: Riding into 2025, where I talk about what happened behind the scenes, what’s happening today and what may or might happen tomorrow in our world of motorcycling and our world in general.
In advance, please excuse any rants if there are any below (I didn’t pre-script writing this) and it’s 100% off-the-cuff. It can be pretty raw information.
So here goes.
2024, the year that storm clouds gathered, formed and we stared battening down the hatches.
So, if you are a prepping type of person, you’ll read that and go, ok, I get it. Maybe you also see the same storm clouds ahead, if not, then read on, enjoy and be enlightened. Information is the key to success.
So, let’s start small with motorcycling, the economy and the world’s problems.
What’s happened behind the scenes already
Good News: A few years ago during the pandemic (what a crappy time for many reasons), motorcycling interest suddenly surged and so did traffic. Could it have been all the government helicopter money? Bored people with more time on their hands than work? Gas prices? Or a genuine interest in smaller, fuel efficient and affordable transportation? Maybe all of them?
The bad news is whatever it was, it’s gone now.
Because of this, motorcycle prices of new and used surged as supply chains broke and even finding a motorcycle was an issue let alone buying a used one for more than it cost new.
This year, we had 3 pieces of news that were shocking, first was MV Agusta early on looking to restructure and then just a month ago KTM announced restructuring and had a very short 60 day time span of “we might be out of business unless….statement”… then VW Group (Ducati, Audi, Volkswagen, Porsche and Lamborghini) looking at a 90 day “we need to solve financial issues or else we close factories, cut stuff and wages aggressively”. Lastly, Nissan and Honda (and Mitsubishi) merged for survival. Mercedes is also in the same boat with factories shutting down and Germany is the industrial life blood of Europe!
Overall, economic environment hasn’t been good for anyone.
Well, that’s not very good news but it does setup the stage for what’s to come in 2025.
What’s happening today
Good news: Manufacturers are really struggling for sales and with a mix of greatly inflated prices and an uncertain economy we are seeing much smaller engine and much more affordable motorcycle models for 2024/2025. New bikes (250cc to 500cc) can be had for under $6000 USD.
What visitors and readers can’t see until it smacks them in the face is the current level of traffic and interest in motorcycles. Rising personal, corporate, government debts, everything inflation and job strikes has caused quite the unstable environment for interest in a 2nd or 4th personal vehicle. Quite understandable too when you have overrun food banks and record numbers of people who do not have $200 in the bank! And back in September 2023, Google also broke internet search (maybe you have noticed) with their “Helpful Content Update” algorithm change. What happened was sites like Reddit (who sold all their user content to Google for AI LLM training) has suddenly taken over first page search results on Google and everything else has dropped to lower page results. This is not only affecting my, TMW’s, traffic but revenue as well and unfortunately, all other sites too. The next nail was Generative AI (such as ChatGPT) scraping pages of sites to get answers (over 700,000 pages from TMW). This caused the double whammy of massive bandwidth use but also less people visiting the actual pages of Total Motorcycle as ChatGPT (etc.) will just provide the answers/content itself. It’s brutal.
And we are not done yet! EV’s.
Yup, you should know by now the push towards Electric Vehicles (cars, motorcycles, etc.) has been a rough roller-coaster ride. A few customers want them while hundreds do not. (99.4% of polled TMW readers in 2024 do not want to own an eBike.) But the push is on! By 2030, our governments tell us 60% of ALL new vehicles sold MUST BE electric, and by 2035, it jumps to 100%. Add in the push to remove manual motorcycle transmissions (eClutch, eAssist, DCT, etc.) and you have a lot of older riders (the VAST majority of bikers) very unhappy. I guess that also brings us the next thing, the increasing age of the average rider. We are just not attracting even close to enough young people to try motorcycling. Whatever we need to crack that nut we just don’t have that tool to do it. That’s why you are seeing motorcycle manufacturers severely struggling today, they are trying everything to solve this mystery, sadly without success, yet.
So the storm clouds are definitely thick and dark, but add to all this the next part you will start to see a full picture of why you need to put on that rain suit sooner rather than later.
What may or might happen tomorrow in our world of motorcycling
Good news: The Electric Vehicle movement is showing signs of collapsing. Yes, Planet Earth, blah, blah, blah. But personally I won’t be happy owning nothing and eating the bugs, thank you. What a collapsing EV market means is consolidation into what customers want and can afford to buy rather than being pushed a very expensive impractical product that a few can afford. Remember, I’m talking about what is GOOD for motorcyclists and motorcycling here and not trying solve world hunger. Producing tried, true and tested products are cheaper, we don’t need to reinvent a round wheel for a new and improved octagon version. Hopefully we see a more reasonable EV future that can mix with an ICE future and everyone is happy… (has there been a time in history where everyone was happy on two different sides?)
Ok, now for the rain: Potential 25-300% Tariffs. Lots and lots of tariffs. I did talk about this a few months ago on Total Motorcycle and if you remember I talked about the devastating impact they will have on motorcycle prices and sales. ANYTHING made outside of the USA will be subject to a 25-300% tax to be SOLD in the USA. That’s a $20,000 Kawasaki Ninja going to $60,000 overnight. Let’s be frank, NO ONE will be buying $60,000 Ninja’s. That’s a death knell to the industry if it goes that high in price. Even a 25% (minimum) tariff tax will be $5000 extra in cost. And it’s not just motorcycles or cars, but everything, even clothing, food and spoons. But it’s just on Countries the USA doesn’t like or get along with? Nope, Allies and their largest trading partners too.
Speaking of the world economy, things are just not commonly 100% made in any one country anymore. Harley-Davidson’s are “assembled in the USA” from parts from factories worldwide. So is food. Look at a food label for origin, it may say “Made from Domestic and Imported Ingredients”. So what happens when you mix the pandemic supply chain issues with massive penalizing tariffs?
War.
Well, it’s does take more than imposing a worldwide recession and/or depression on your allies to create a world war, but it does work, after all, it worked on Japan in 1943 by blocking 80% of their imports (including energy) and caused Japan to enter the war against the USA by bombing Pearl Harbor.
So we are looking at a very real possibility (even with Trump in) that NATO with Article 5 is fighting WWIII against Russia, China, Iran, Lebanon, Yemen, Syria, North Korea, Turkey, Hungry, Georgia, Belarus and even India to mention a few. Incredible to think about that isn’t it? But there you go. And will the internet survive all this in its current form? Doubt it, right? Let’s hope all this doesn’t come to pass and common ground can be found before more unstoppable Oreshnik missiles arrive in a city near you.
Back in the USA, Trump is #AmericaFirst and while 49.8% of American’s are crossing their fingers and thanking God Trump was re-elected (Trump won 77,284,118 votes, or 49.8 percent of the votes), we will know in the first 100 days, and again in the next two years, if Trump’s policies are helping or hurting the economy. There are also concerns the cabinet is being filled with those that may be working against the common American such as Neocons (pro-War members on either side), foreign interests (eg, Israel), Billionaire lobbying groups and Billionaire’s themselves (like Elon Musk).
Going back to the EU, it’s one of the main reasons factories are shutting down in Germany, like VW and Mercedes. Right now Europeans are facing an economic depression in the next two years, and that ain’t good for motorcycle sales!
Like Russia, American can become self-sufficient but it will take time, years in fact, to build the factories, reskill the labor and re-price goods. American goods will cost more and not only for Americans. So we may see a future where there are a lot less foreign motorcycle goods and products if those manufacturers don’t manufacture inside the USA or meet tariff requirements. Thus we could see an end to a lot of brands, not just those in trouble like Ducati, KTM and MV Agusta. But Honda, Suzuki, Kawasaki, BMW, Husqvarna, Aprilia, Moto Guzzi, Vespa, Ural… really, anything is on the table. Harley-Davidson and Indian Motorcycle may be the ones most stable as they are built in Milwaukee, WI and Springfield, OH, but I bet they also use foreign parts.
Summary
There is much more I could and can say, but you got the tip of the iceberg. I tried not to be too down or depressing and offer up some good news too. Re-read the above article, do your own research and take actions you feel are appropriate.
But please, put on your rain gear and hope there is a fork in the road that turns away from the storm or a place you can seek shelter.
Thank you for supporting Total Motorcycle as a site and please, turn off that Ad-Blocker for now. We want to be here for 2026. We want to bring you exciting and engaging motorcycle models, reviews, information and news. Keep us on the road.
Happy New Year 2025 and I leave you with what I said back in April 2020 as the pandemic just started to bite:
“May you live in interesting times” (is an English expression that is claimed to be a translation of a traditional Chinese curse. The expression is ironic: “interesting” times are usually times of trouble.)
