Motorcycle Dealership Mojo

…and the lack thereof…

 

Disclaimer: The opinion I am sharing is based upon my limited experience visiting and dealing with motorcycle shops over the past five decades.

 

My local Moto Guzzi dealership just closed. The place also sold Aprilia, BMW, Vespa, Royal Enfield and a couple of electrics. Good selection. Not so hot as a dealership. Why? There seemed an element missing. Entering felt a bit like dropping into your nearest Ford dealership to look at the latest F-150 or the Chevy Man looking for an Impala or a Malibu. “What’ll it take to get you into this baby today?”

     Motorcycles – particularly European ones – are different from automobiles. While many who ride motorcycles started out on a dependable Honda (I did)...

... Yamaha, or like Asian brand, some of us progress – or maybe evolve – into enthusiasts that might be looking for something more. Something that might defy definition.

     My transition to a European marque happened nearly forty-plus years ago when I wandered into Ozzie’s BMW in Chico, California and eventually rode out on a beautiful black R65 roadster. Ozzie, with his thick German accent talked with enthusiasm about the area roads I might enjoy astride one even allowing me to take his personal R65S on a fifty-mile round trip run up to a foothill community. I was as much sold on the dealership as I was on the bike. Mojo.

     Ozzie was famous. On a visit to a dealership in Seattle where I was drooling over BMW’s latest and greatest, when the salesfloor guy found out I was from Chico, he offered a light punch on my shoulder and said, “Hell, you’ll be buying one from Ozzie!” (I didn’t.) That said, more mojo.

 

I gave up riding for a decade or so, but upon a second or third relocation, stumbled into A&S BMW in Roseville, California. I’d never lost the itch and a lovely blue R1100 roadster, used, grabbed at my throttle hand and wouldn’t let go. On this particular Saturday, Candi, my beloved was catching up on schoolwork in her classroom, when I drove by, stopped and hailed her out of her classroom. 

     “Wow!” she said. “They let you test drive that bike all by yourself!” 

     “No,” I responded as I lit out for home. 

     What was special about A&S? Beyond selection, it was the enthusiast nature of the sales guys. They all wore riding boots and were eager to share their favorite Sacramento area route: Highway 49 north to Nevada City and Downieville, south to Placerville and Sonora, highway 50 over Echo Summit; 160 (?) out through the delta. The list I would travel on that R1100 was nearly endless and with each service visit I’d be asked, “Where’ve you been lately?” 

Dealership mojo would prompt me to purchase the 1100’s replacement and a couple of other rides.

     Eventually, I bought a used Moto Guzzi from A&S. Shaft drive, bullet proof motor, Italian elegance, my drift from the German to its European neighbor was unavoidable. I’d hankered for a Guzzi after having visited Dave Richardson’s Moto Internationale in Seattle with my riding buddy. Squeezed into a tiny showroom was a row of Guzzi’s limited models and a few Aprilias for the racing crowd Dave likely hoped to attract. 

The visit with the owner proved to be less about buying a gorgeous 1400 California touring bike and more about where I’d could go on it. Knowing that I’d already played that card once, I didn’t come home with one. 

     Later, visiting the Guzzi dealership in Austin Texas, AF-1, while I sat on a white California, the sales guy, finding out that Candi was a quilter engaged in a forty minute discussion about fabric and stitches and batting and stuff.  I wandered in and the fellow asked if I was ready to ride the California back home to California I came close to saying yes accept that it was the first week in January and I knew that the ride across the south and over the Sierra would be colder than a well-diggers instep in the Klondike. Still: Seattle mojo, Austin mojo. 

  

Fast forward to life in Sonoma County. Roads to the coast are exquisite and there’s several of ‘em. Add to that, multiple ways through the Mayacamas range and into the Sacramento Valley or north or south on US 101 and I’d landed in a motorcycle enthusiasts dreamscape. My first purchase would be a classically styled V-7 roadster... 

...which lasted about a year and a half when I became smitten with a more touring-oriented model. 

     Entering the showroom of this dealership – part of a small chain with showrooms in Reno and Vegas – seemed different from those listed above. They seemed lacking an inventory of don’t-miss-this riding destinations or stories from staff about their favorite routes. Videos of moto-GPs were not being shown. Displays seemed a bit perfunctory – except for their BMW selection in that BMW requires certain showroom attributes. Although I bit twice, the “what’ll it take to get you into this little beauty today" seemed not too far off, perhaps second only to the practice of not engaging the walk-in customer with more than “Hi. How are ya?” 

     Still, I’ve enjoyed all aspects of my Guzzi V-85tt except for a service issue – one perhaps NOT the responsibility of any dealer. It seems my sample came with a cracked fuel bladder, one that emitted the smell of gas when sitting in the garage.  The part would need to be ordered from the factory in Mandello de Lario back in the old country. Might take some time. Figuring on a couple of weeks, my ride sat in the service bay for six. I’m not sure what the Italian version of laisse faire is, but the Maybe tomorrow, Luigi corporate attitude of Piaggio, Guzzi’s parent group, was doing neither the customer nor the dealer any favors.

     Five weeks gone, with a trip to Oregon scheduled in but a few days, and recalling more than one story about a BMW rider who would have been stranded had the dealer not pulled a part off a new bike to install it on the customer’s, I eyed a new V-85tt that had been sitting on the showroom floor since before I’d dropped off my disabled version. “Isn’t there a tank bladder in that one?” I thought but didn’t articulate. A shop with mojo might have already seen that as a customer-oriented solution.

     Ultimately, the tank was replaced under warranty and down the road I went just in time for Crater Lake and environs... 

... however, after a time, that gas smell redeveloped and I returned to the service bay to have ‘em check things out. I didn’t know at the time that they had given up the Guzzi/Aprilia/Vespa franchise. “A couple of valves under the tank have fractured. We don’t have any in stock and can’t order them any longer because we’re no longer a dealer.” I turned to my pals at AF-1 in Austin who graciously accepted my order but informed me that the parts would need to come from Maybe tomorrow, Luigi in Italy. 

     Two months passed while I gingerly rode the beast and left it outside allowing the fumes to dissipate before parking it in the garage. The parts arrived – including a 50% tariff – and I hauled them down to my local dealer only to find the entire shop – BMWs and everything – boarded up. No mojo. No nothin’.  

 

 

Dave Harris and Keli Litle operate a wonderful independent motorcycle repair shop in Point Arena, California called The Zen House. They sponsor touring rides for enthusiasts and host moto-GP viewing parties at a local eatery. Traveling enthusiast-renowned Stewart’s Point Skaggs Springs Road out to the coast is always a delight and David said if I had the parts, he’d eagerly install ‘em. (I knew of The Zen House as I had David rebuild my brother’s classic 80s era BMW R80RT. The results were awe-inspiring.)

     My November ride started at 46 degrees, downshifted to 39 and fluctuated into the low 60s and back. The wait time – not two months – was but forty minutes and an interesting verdict came when I retrieved the bike. The valves were not damaged, but he replaced ‘em anyway. It seems the odor came from the line that was not securely attached to the O2 canister. A cost-free, two-minute fix that could have occurred during the ‘inspection’ back in August. [Thanks for your eagle eye and your always attention to detail service, David!]

Motorcycle dealers need competent mechanics and it helps if they have affable sales folks. But dealer personnel don’t need to be interested in where you’ve been or where you’re going or make suggestions of routes to travel. They don’t need to have motorcycle races running silently in the background. They certainly don’t need to entertain tag-a-longs with tips about threads or fabrics or quilting or pie making or how to puree tomatoes.

     They don’t need to demonstrate that elusive thing that might be known as mojo. But successful dealerships do.

 

References:

 

Ozzie’s BMW – Chico https://www.ozziesbmwmotorcycles.com

A&S Powersports – Roseville https://www.aspowersports.com

AF-1 Racing – Austin https://www.af1racing.com

The Zen House – Point Arena https://www.thezenhouse.net

 

© 2025

Church of the Open Road Press

ANOTHER SUNDAY RIDE

…two hours

and a half gallon of gas…

 

 

I decide it’s finally time to give up on riding motorcycles – safety wise, aging, etc. – and then a Sunday afternoon like yesterday happens. 

     Lazing around after coffee and a three mile walk, the current novel I’m reading lacked pull, the New York Times crossword proved too difficult – as it always does – and a nap seemed a waste of an 80-degree November afternoon. Do I really want to go through the hassle of pulling on riding gear and heading out. Actually, no, I didn’t. But I do so, anyway.

     The Royal Enfield at 411ccs is my other bike. It’s the one that requires little thought or maintenance. Lube the chain. Check the oil. Ride. The scant engine produces barely enough power for the thing to get out of its own way, but on hilly wine country by-ways, you don’t need power. Just wind on the helmet and associated fresh air.

     

Sunday’s ride would be both wind and fresh air and more. Eight miles from home I venture west on Dry Creek Road toward Lake Sonoma, thence to Stewarts Point Skaggs Springs Road. This mythical route is sought out by fellas on big displacement rice-rockets and euro-sports. The 35 mile-per-hour speed limit signs don’t even rate as a suggestion. A pair of road racers scream eastbound around a sweeping curve – rider’s knees inches above the pavement – as I tootle west. They drop their left hands for the perfunctory wave, as do I, when we pass. I’m enjoying the autumn hills dotted with golden oaks, digger pines and early vestiges of winter grass. I wonder about the tradeoff between the thrill of awesome speed and precise handling versus the sublime beauty of the rolling coast range in mid-fall. See ‘aging,’ above. Another pair race by, low-hand wave. 

     I’ve driven this route from the Russian River drainage all the way out to the Pacific Ocean several times on several different machines. BMW(s), a Triumph, a Yamaha, Guzzi(s) and I find myself calling myself fickle. Oh! The money I’ve wasted on motorcycle turnover. Yet, each one was unique. Each with its own character. Each filling a particular ‘need’ at a particular time. Today’s need would be to get out and enjoy some fresh air but not be gone so long that the left knee gets too stove up. 

     There’d be no particular destination, though I knew it wouldn’t be all the way out to the coast.

 

Stewart’s Point Skaggs Springs is a relatively new iteration. Forty-plus years ago, as Sonoma County burgeoned, the long-planned Warm Springs Dam was completed, impounding Dry Creek and its tributaries for much-needed water. Prior to that development, Skaggs Springs Road followed Dry Creek into the hills to a 1900s-era resort and continued west from there to the Pacific. That road was lost as Lake Sonoma filled and the new route was created: Twelve miles of lovely, wide pavement over gentle crests and sweeping curves through eastern-most redwood stands and oaks. Why wouldn’t I ride this every day of the year?

     A big BMW GS approaches – I used to have one of those – and a Harley and another Beemer. The riders are in no kind of hurry. They wave, as do I. Up ahead, I spot a silver trailer moving west along what will be my route. Within minutes, I catch up. It seems a Dodge Ram 3500 pulling a trailer full of about 15 head of cattle must be even more judicious on this road than I. So do his two associates. The bovine aroma isn’t at all offensive, rather, it is simply rural. I damper down to about fifteen miles per hour awaiting a section not curvy or hilly enough that I can safely pass the first cowboy. Don’t want to tangle with the next Ducati or Hayabusa, if any, screaming from the other direction. I’m noticing the fenceline, rotted posts suspended by barbwire strands; and skeletal evidence of a five-years-back wildfire – so many little details. Then I pass the second truck. 

     Perhaps two minutes after eclipsing number three, I come to a junction. Ahead, I know the lovely engineering will end, as the route returns to the original with broken, hummocky pavement, dips and cracks and conditions that will slow down those hotshots coming from the coast. The right turn, which I take, finds me on the western portion of the Old Skaggs Springs Road – a decrepit four-mile piece that didn’t get covered by the lake. Venturing along it’s clear that this section hasn’t seen repair other than the occasional sack of cold-patch asphalt in the forty-plus years since the dam was completed. 

     Folks live down this way. There are a couple of rustic residences and, somehow, a banjo starts to twang in my head. I’m following a creek’s mini canyon. Trees bending low. Occasional glimpses of sunlight reflecting off a tiny pool. Dodging some rockfall and attempting to avoid potholes that pock the surface, one’s that still await cold patch, likely in vain.

     An industrial strength gate closes the road before I can get to the water. Dismounting, although less than twenty-five miles from home, I feel like I’m in a different state; a different world: quiet save for the murmur of the leaves as the down canyon breeze tries to lose them from the sycamores and black oaks; tiny, upper-range piano-like music emanates from the little brook. 

     Getting off the saddle is good for that game left knee. I ambled a few yards down the rest of the road to the water's edge; there thinking about those rich folk who frequented that resort a few miles east and now about fifty feet deep. Good life, 1900s version.

 

The return would be just as delightful. Sun, curves, scenery and no cows. At one point I approach four bikes on side stands at the side of the road with their riders milling about. Good member of the motorcycle community that I am, I stop.

     “Everybody okay?” I ask.

     The rider of a BMW has a grin that would light up midnight. “Yeah, you?”

     His partner has a lovely Triumph Bonneville-based café style bike. Stunning red. He eyeballs my Himalayan. “What is that?”

     “It’s my other bike.”

     “Other bike? What else you got?” asks Beemer man.

     “Guzzi. V-85.”

     “Really? I have a couple of Guzzis. An original V-7 from the 90s.”

     Seems as if everybody has owned a Moto Guzzi at one time or another – or wanted to. "I’m on my third Goose including a V-7 from the 2020s I had for a short time."

    The Triumph rider repeats: “What is that?”

     I explain that my Royal Enfield, though designed in England is built in India, “but every part that falls off represents the pinnacle of British engineering,” for which I receive a knowing nod.

     I point at the engine. “Twenty-two horses.”

     Triumph guy cautions: “Don’t wanna use ‘em all at once.”

     Chuckles abound.

     Before pulling away, someone says, “Well, have a pleasant day.”

     Wind on the helmet, autumn sun and colors and knowing pavement that awaits, I respond, “How could you not?”

 

I’m thinking I’ll put off giving up motorcycles for a bit longer.

 

© 2025

Church of the Open Road Press