INSIDE STORY: the CW / BMW split…

CW Motorcycles’ Dorchester based BMW franchise, one of the longest standing and most respected Solus dealerships in the country, will come to an end next July. This is the story of the end of a very long standing affair.

As from this December they will not be selling any new BMW stock, although many will be relieved to hear that the business itself will continue. For over 40 years CW has remained in the same ownership; staff and customers alike tended to be in it for the long haul. For almost all that time they’ve been involved with BMW. 

Over the last eighteen months or so, I’d heard that things were getting tight for Solus outfits. The casualty list – reduced networks, with some establishments going out of business altogether – seemed to be on the increase. I wanted to get an insider’s point of view, and Dave Wyndham – CW’s founder – generously agreed to enlighten me. What I didn’t know at the time was that Dave was himself negotiating CW’s own exit from the franchise. 

Dave Wyndham founded CW, and four decades on enjoys a reputation for playing with a straight bat, which explains the high degree of customer loyalty to the business. He figured out a long time ago that engaging rather than alienating them was the way forward: which sounds painfully obvious.  However, go back just a few years and the experience of walking into a dealer’s could be very different. To be met with indifference, contempt and sometimes frank hostility was part and parcel of shopping around. Which is where we kicked off when I went to meet him this October.

NB – There were some right characters behind the counter back in the day, and that’s putting it kindly. It may be a less memorable experience these days, but the service has definitely improved…

DW – Thank goodness! We’ve always treated the customer as a person first foremost. We valued that interaction: what is the point in meeting someone with a common interest if you can’t  engage with them as a human being? As a result we ended up doing stuff together; organised tours every summer, just mucking in and messing about. Many customers became friends: I’ve been to weddings and, inevitably, funerals. 

In general though, customer relations have changed beyond recognition. Consumer law and financial regulation have transformed the environment. You have more choice as to how you pay, and you have statutory protection as a purchaser. In other words a certain ethical approach is enshrined in regulation, and unpopular as this sentiment may be in some quarters, the EU have played a positive role in that.

NB – And for dealers? A better or worse experience?

DW – To some extent that depends on the type of dealership we’re talking about, but… I think you would struggle to find anyone who has been in the game long term who would claim that it’s more enjoyable now. It’s not.

We’re part of a partnership with the importer / manufacturer, and anyone

in that situation kind of co-operates in a coercive process. We’re caught in the middle between the manufacturer and the customer, and these days that’s not a particularly fun place to be. And yet enjoyment and enthusiasm were the original reasons behind setting this place up.

NB – So once you become corporatised things change, right?

DW – All I wanted to do was give a good service to local motorcyclists, and I’d love to see us get back to that. If there’s a way we can, then we will.

There’s a lot of ways you can have fun in the bike trade: being a Solus dealer isn’t one of them. Financially, a one man servicing operation – or trading a few out of a shed – are both probably more profitable models..

NB – That’s a pretty sobering thought.

DW – There’s a lot of greedy people in this business. The cost of distributing mainstream brands and the degree of control exercised by them are both issues. The margins just aren’t there. You’re going to find that outside major conurbations you might have to travel 50 miles to your nearest Solus dealer. The market is changing: other brands offering a more attractive business model will move in to fill the gaps. They already are.

NB – Plus there’s a definite move towards lower tec, less powerful machines – like some of the Chinese powered bikes, or the Enfields – and those manufacturers don’t insist on exclusively branded showrooms, they aren’t threatened by their new bikes sitting next to used stock from other marques….

DW – Exactly. Which is why your Enfields or Lexmotos or similar will be the brands on sale around the corner.

NB – So despite the confidence engendered by a Solus dealer experience – the one which tells a customer these people are BMW or Triumph or whoever through and through – restrictive practices placed on them are threatening their existence?

DW – Absolutely. If that trend continues, there are going to be major problems ahead for this model of dealership. There’s a precedent: Suzuki insisted on dealers going Solus back in the day, and the end result was that they lost dealerships. It was an unsustainable model, and that was at a time when they were still major players in the UK market.

NB – They’ve been swamped, fallen way behind the curve. Any Solus dealer always has to factor that possibility in, on top of all the other issues…

DW … the logical conclusion being that unless manufacturers relax their

restrictions, rethink margins and re-define the Solus concept, they will lose dealers from the network. In my opinion the manufacturer also has a moral obligation, because control should bring with it a certain degree of responsibility – and control is what they exercise. 

It’s actually in the manufacturers’ interest to delegate a degree of freedom to their dealers, but some are too wrapped up in the fantasy of their corporate image to understand that. Which explains one of their alternative models: the advent of the mega dealer, car / bike showrooms, a concept which completely ignores the otherness of biking, its essentially non utilitarian premise. Maybe people do want to visit a car showroom annex to buy their bikes, but it seems to me that if anything there’s a move away from that type of buying experience.

                                                                                                 

Looking back on that exchange, the writing was very clearly on the wall. Much of what Dave had to say was mirrored in conversations I had with other dealers: they too expressed the same frustrations, many of them directed against what they saw as the restrictive agenda of major manufacturers. They all welcomed the possibilities offered by working with alternative sources whose demands were negligible by comparison, and whose product was more affordable to customers and dealers alike.

But it would be a mistake to attribute change solely to big players desperate to increase shareholder revenue. There’s been a cultural shift in biking      at consumer level, marked by a relative disinterest in high end, high       tec, high performance product. New registrations in the 650cc + sector declined over a twelve month period from September 2018; every category under 650 increased. And that has to be placed in a context where people over the age of 40 accounted for more than half the UK’s motorcycle miles – the implication being that it isn’t just relative newcomers buying smaller capacity machines.

The point about all this is that there seems to be an increasing disjunct between manufactures offering high end machines (like 200bhp sportsbikes), the people who have to sell them, and those who might consider buying them. No one should forget that it is the consumer who ultimately calls the shots, not the manufacturers or their marketing – and consumers are turning away from flagship product, and in doing so are increasing the pressure on those under fire Solus margins. Bearing all this in mind, it’ll be very interesting to see where Dave Wyndham takes CW next year…