RE Back to Winning
Royal Enfield saw sales slip for 36 consecutive months, but the numbers for February put the company back in the green. The real question is if the company can keep this positive momentum rolling as 2020 continues. I reported the other day that India’s motorcycle market was down again overall. However, Royal Enfield and Suzuki managed to see sales go up when compared to last year.
The company saw sales rise by two percent for the month of February. Obviously, this hasn’t made up all of the ground that the company lost over the last 36 months, but it’s a step in the right direction. The company moved 61,188 units last month.
Over the last several months of declining sales, one good thing Royal Enfield had going for it was the fact that it was exporting 650 Twins out to the world and they were selling well. However, while domestic India sales were up for RE, the company actually saw a decline in 650 sales outside of India.
According to Gaadi Waadi, the company only exported 2,348 units when last year this time they’d exported 2,564. This could mark a slowdown for those models. It will be interesting to see what happens in the coming months. I think the export decline will pick back up and RE will see sales rise across the board in the coming months now that the emissions hurdles have been passed.
When a company says they “moved 61,188 units last month,” does that mean sold, or distributed to dealers, or what exactly? Seems like that it also is an indicator of the vast size of the Indian market – a certain bar-n-shield company would be in the throes of ecstasy to sell 60K units in a month.