"My love for a Harley has limits"

Van Malsen has earned more than 35,000 euros for his motorcycle. This is the largest model that Harley-Davidson wears. "Clean on the hook nearly four hundred pounds. Lots of chrome, lots of glitter and glamor, completely my thing."

The engine maker has already calculated that a Harley engine would average $ 2,200 more expensive because of rate increases. For the Van Malsen engine, the price would be much higher. "If you get that on your plate, you will have to swallow it."

Then choose or share. "If I continue with that, then you also talk about: what is the strength of the brand?" says Van Malsen, who works in advertising and is heavily involved in the promotion and development of brands

"De bevrijder"

and the brand is strongly linked to the country of production, the United States, explains- there. This has to do with the Second World War. "Harley-Davidson then made a very good deal with the US Army, which needed engines for troop movements, which gave them a lot of public relations." Liberator, with which they also entered Europe, the liberator's engine. "

His father also drove as a military police on such an engine after liberation in Indonesia, he said. "It's where it started, it's like that he's met my mother too – their first date was also on a Harley-Davidson." Van Malsen himself has only been on an American engine since 2009. "For economic reasons," he laughs.

If the engines became even more expensive, he could leave a new one. "Until where my love goes it affects my wallet so that you can enjoy Harley-Davidson and your life, that's my lust, but not my life."

Hot Sandwiches

He's not the only one he thinks he does, he knows it. As a member of the Rock City Chapter Amersfoort, with 1200 members the largest motorcycle club Harley-Davidson in Europe, he saw himself perform: "At the beginning of the year I heard many members of my club say, well, I go they quickly bought a motorcycle, they came out like hot sandwiches, and people certainly changed their decision. "

This resistance to even higher prices is precisely why Harley-Davidson does not want to pass the increases to potential buyers. The company said that it will first take additional taxes at its own expense.

She sold about 40,000 engines in Europe last year, which is the biggest market after America. The tariff increase would cost the company over $ 90 million a year with these numbers.

Between the ears

Politics is not often part of the Rock City Chapter, not even the commercial conflict and President Trump. "Everyone has a say, the opinions that are here are actually the opinions that you hear everywhere in the Netherlands, and the love for the American brand has not worsened, but it is pity Trump do the same "

Van Malsen does not believe that the American image will be altered when more and more engines are manufactured outside the US This image" is just between the ears. "