Google Earth view of the new location at Delamere on the A556

Knutsford Motorcycles, formerly Knutsford Honda and before that, some years ago, GoldWing International, is closing its doors today prior to relocation.  The business, including its GoldWing Accessory stock and mail order business, having been taken over by J&S Accessories of Northwich.

The doors at their High Legh Site on the A50 close to business today in order to start the relocation, while things are quieter, to a new J&S site which is being developed about 10 miles away at Delamere, Sandiway.  This is a large site on the A556 and used to be occupied by a caravan and motorhome dealer.  It has large showroom and other buildings including a well equipped cafe.  There is also a Pub right next door.

The idea is to recreate the open and accessible display of GoldWing Accesories which was so attractive to Wingers in the Knutsford Showroom in its own section of what will be a very large showroom indeed.  J&S have been trying to expand within Northwich, the town where the business started up, for some time but when this site became available moving their headquarters from Northwich to the A556 at Delamere (allowing expansion to incorporate the Knutsford Motorcycles business) became a more attractive option.

For Wingers it was disappointing to lose Knutsford Honda, which owners Eric and Bridget Warburton tried very hard to build up as a GoldWing specialist Honda Dealership but it was not successful and after unsuccessful efforts to get HondaUK to loosen its corsets and give them a chance to develop a viable business model as a specialist dealership, they dumped the franchise. continues………

This was my first attempt to use the Blog to conduct an opinion survey and so it was something of an experiment.  Hopefully the results will stimulate some discussion.

I asked Blog Readers to assume they are about to buy their next GoldWing, have two equally suitable bikes, one being sold by a Honda Dealer, the other one by a non-Honda dealer.  There are no differences in part exchange or guarantee and it didn’t even matter whether the bikes are new or used, the only difference was the price – the Honda Dealer was asking more because he feels he’s offering a better, quality-assured service.

The question you Readers were invited to answer was:  How valuable is it to you to buy a GoldWing from a franchised Honda Dealer, in other words how much extra would you pay for your next GoldWing for the benefits of buying from an official Honda Dealer, compared with any other motorcycle dealer?

The response rate was low in relation to the Blog’s readership numbers and this certainly needs to be taken into account when interpreting this result.  Respondents could very easily be a biased sample, for example because only those who hold strong feelings (for example of personal disappointment) about Honda bothered to take the survey.

Having said that there is at least a suggestion from this Survey that a surprisingly large proportion of GoldWing owners attach little or no value to buying from a franchised Honda Dealer.  Why could that be? continues………

A conversation with a Honda Dealer sparked the idea for this opinion survey; he was telling me about a Winger who was considering buying a new GoldWing from him who seemed to attach little or no value to buying from a franchised Honda Dealer.

HondaUK would like us to share their confidence that all franchised Honda dealers can provide good sales and after sales support for all their motorcycles, including GoldWings, and that theirs is a better and therefore more valuable service than we can get elsewhere.  It is however possible to buy new as well as used GoldWings without going to a franchised Honda dealer in UK,  so I thought it would be interesting to ask Wingers how they feel about the value of franchised Honda dealerships these days.

I haven’t tried doing an opinion survey on the Blog before so it’s also something of an experiment so please spare me a few moments to take part.  The more responses we get the more reliable the survey will be.  There is only this one question to answer and you won’t have to identify yourself any way unless you want to.  The results will be published in due course, once I have had a decent number of responders, hopefully fairly quickly.

Let’s assume for purposes of this survey that you are about to buy your next GoldWing and you have found two equally suitable bikes, one being sold by a Honda Dealer, the other one by a non-Honda dealer.  There are no differences in what they will offer as part exchange and the guarantee is the same, so ignore those factors.  It doesn’t even matterwhether the bikes are new or used, the only difference is the price – the Honda Dealer is asking more because he feels he’s offering a better, quality-assured service.

This Survey is now closed and the result will be announced shortly.

The questions was:  How valuable is it to you to buy a GoldWing from a franchised Honda Dealer, in other words how much extra would you pay for your next GoldWing for the benefits of buying from an official Honda Dealer, compared with any other motorcycle dealer?

Stylish Coffee bar too

The place to take the wife shopping before Christmas has to be Knutsford Motorcycles, where Paul and his staff will be offering bargain prices on shiny bits for a whole week and a day in early December.

Kuryakyn stuff will be 20% off List and everything else 30% – and these are genuine discounts on normal list prices, not some artificial price, so a real bargain.

A Burger Van will be in attendance on both Saturdays and the Coffee Machine will be free all week, so a hearty welcome too.  Knutsford Motorcycles do of course also have the most civilised ladies toilettes in the motorcycling hemisphere so she’ll be well catered for too.

Knutsford Motorcycles are in the GoldWing Accessory business long-term and they carry very big stocks of Show Chrome, Add On, Superbrace and Hopnel as well as Kuryakyn, all well displayed on wall racks and similar so that you can drool in comfort whilst sipping a free beverage.  This is the place to bring her indoors along in order to drop hints about Christmas presents for the bike.  Alternatively of course you could leave her at home and bring the credit card instead.

Accessory fitting services will be available as usual.

Open 9am to 5pm daily except Sunday 4th December when it will be 11am to 4pm.

For further details ring Paul on 01925 752600 or visit www.knustfordmotorcycles.co.uk

Dave Partridge

Dave Partridge, who offers mobile servicing for GoldWings , under the trading name of AwingAway, based on Staffordshire, has just come up with some very tempting prices for servicing – including the opportunity to get your MOT done free of charge providing it’s done at the same time.  You get a free 10-point safety check on the bike even if an MOT is not required.

That strikes me as a staggeringly good offer and reason to get your MOT done while Dave’s at it, even if it’s not yet due, so that you can get yourself synchronised for next year.  Giving your bike an annual service and safety check is no bad thing regardless of the mileage you have done and doing it every year at the same time makes it easier to remember to do it.  Dave might even send you a  reminder next year!

Obviously this doesn’t include the cost of any additional work which might be needed, but it’s a fixed price for the service and the fixed prices are very keen at that – substantially lower than you would pay probably elsewhere.

Dave is a qualified motorcycle technician and a GoldWing owner himself.  He’s also th technical Editor of the Federation of UK GoldWing Clubs and you can pick his brains, free of charge, about any GoldWing technical problem you might have by using the Technical Enquiry Service on the Federation’s Website.

I’ve heard nothing but glowing reports of Dave’s work and can therefore thoroughly recommend him.  He will travel reasonable distances to do servicing work, which could also be attractive to you.  Dave is offering an innovative service to Wingers which is proving very popular.

You can contact Dave on 07795 095043 or by email to dave©awingaway•co•uk

You can also view a leaflet about Dave’s services which details his prices by clicking here.

A new business, a new approach

I was able to interview Eric Warburton this morning – well technically it was yesterday morning, since it’s past midnight as I press the button to publish this article.  Eric was the proprietor of Knutsford Honda and is now proprietor of Knutsford Motorcycles, an independent bike and accessory store, operating from the same premises and with broadly the same staff.

Things had seemed to be going well, so why did Eric decide to pull the plug and start again in a new guise?

It was of course very disappointing from the viewpoint of the UK GoldWing Community to lose the only contender within living memory to set out from the beginning to be a Specialist GoldWing Honda Dealer.

Eric, a long time GoldWing man himself, had run a motorcycle businesses successfully in the past and hosted others.  But he’d never before taken a manufacturer’s franchise, always preferring to be free to do his own business thing.  Becoming a franchised dealer meant adopting Honda’s way of doing things.  Would that mean living under Honda’s thumb?

Eric has owned the premises at High Legh on the A50 for many years and motorcycle dealerships, including a franchised dealership had been run from this site before, not least of course Eric’s own continues………

John Wakefield (left) a very helpful man

I was wandering past the Arai stand at Northwich Thundersprint last weekend and noticed that there were two men working busily on bikers’ helmets, indeed there was a bit of a queue of bikers forming.

They seemed to be fitting stick-on inner “double glazing” lenses as visor attachments which prevent fogging and they were obviously making a very thorough job of cleaning and servicing the helmet visors while they were at it.  I’ve since discovered that this product is called Fine Vision and is available for self installation on almost all helmets, ie any manufacturer.

I wear an open face Arai which is very comfortable but the right hand side visor hinge has been popping off from time to time (since I dropped the helmet on to it if the truth be told) and I couldn’t work out why.  Bring it along and we’ll look at it for you, the man said.

This was late morning and the sunshine had arrived, and with it the crowds were building up too, so it was a bit of a bun fight to work my way to the bike and back with the helmet, but I made it and joined the queue.

Watching the Arai Man handle a helmet was a treat to the eye. His practised dexterity was impressive continues………

Knutsford Honda - a magnet for Wingers in the North West

In a surprising development, Knutsford Honda have announced that they are in process of reliquishing their Honda franchise and will in future be operating under the name of Knutsford Motorcycles.

Thankfully however they will be continuing to specialise in GoldWings and GoldWing Accessories, so this valuable and relatively recent addition to UK’s limited selection of GoldWing specialist dealers is not being lost.

Quite what has led to this decision is not clear but it may stem from the way in which HondaUK operates. There have been indications of concern about the quality of support which HondaUK offers to its Motorcycle Dealers and this may have something to do with this decision. Time will tell.

Biggest UK stocks of GoldWing accessories

Certainly it should be a concern to HondaUK that they have lost the Dealer who last year sold more new GoldWings than any other.

Modern, attractive Showroom

Knutsford Honda have a very smart, modern and well located showroom with excellent workshop facilities and from a rider’s viewpoint they will be a sad loss to Honda’s very limited list of UK dealers.  There is of course a precedent for a GoldWing specialist Honda Dealer continuing without a Honda Franchise because Appleyards have been doing it successfully for some time.  But UK GoldWing owners will perhaps be wanting to see clearer evidence that the manufacturer is genuinely interested in supporting the GoldWing model in UK than has been apparent in recent years too.

I hope to learn more of Eric’s plans for Knutsford Motorcycles (including why he’s not planning to resurrect the name of GoldWing International) as soon as practicable.  Maybe I’ll be able to find out a little more about HondaUK’s plans for GoldWing dealerships, now that they’ve lost a second one to their fold, and so soon after it opened.

Motorhomes with tow bars for hire

I came across a new hire company, Motorhomes UK, which has shown special interest in catering for GoldWing riders.

There’s a growing interest among Wingers in motorhomes as a way of enjoying their motorcycling; they can provide a comfortable base at a rally or for a touring holiday – you make your journey to the rally or your holiday touring area and then enjoy your bike as well as your motorhome comforts when you get there.

Motorhomes have become a popular alternative for Wingers to hotel-based touring as well as sleeping in a tent.  But motorhomes are expensive to buy – indeed it’s often been suggested that buying a motorhome which you use for only annual holidays and a weekends each your is more expensive per night than staying in five star hotels.

The initial cost of a new or newish one is high (most of them cost well over £30,000 when they are new) and as with any vehicle they depreciate – and that’s the big part of the cost.  Other running costs, like insurance, is relatively cheap but depreciation, even though motorhomes don’t depreciate as steeply as other vehicles, is the killer cost. continues………

Eric & Bridget at Knutsford Honda

During 2010 Knutsford Honda, despite having opened its doors as a new Honda Dealership little more than two years ago, has already become HondaUK’s top seller of GoldWings – outselling all other UK Honda Dealers this year.

Knutsford Honda has also already become the biggest stockist of GoldWing Accessories in UK, holding in their large, open-plan upstairs showroom the biggest stocks and by far the largest displays of chrome and other accessories for GoldWings anywhere in UK.  There are accessories for Classic as well as more recent model GoldWings and their sales and servicing also covers all GoldWing models.

The owners of the business, Eric Warburton and his wife Bridget, can be justly proud of what has been achieved in this short time and when I spoke to Eric recently it was clear that he has no intention of resting on his laurels.  Eric plans to continue building the GoldWing side of his business even further.

To that end Eric has now taken personal charge of its management and he intends to recruit more and more specialised GoldWing-oriented staff in coming months to achieve his aim.  Eric also sees very clearly the value of building and maintaining good relations with the UK GoldWing community rather continues………