Month: November 2009

Lest we forget La Vita…

On the heels of the EICMA Pato Lambretta unveiling, Scootin’ Old Skool says Scoot About says Hammerhead’s “La Vita” faux-Vespa scooter will be available in the spring. Of course last spring, Scootin’ Old Skool said that Scoot About said it’d be out last summer, for what that’s worth. That said, Orin has a few good photos, and some more details about colors and seats. Like we said in our 2009 Dealer Expo Story, the Venti (as it was known then) really has the proportions and look of a vintage Vespa nailed down, if the engineering and quality are solid, it should be a popular bike.

Jordan’s CWC party photos!

How’s this look?

[Show as slideshow]

Doing some more gallery testing, got my favorite gallery (NextGen Gallery for WordpPress) to work (thanks, Tilted.net support!) so now it’s a matter of testing and getting everything dialed in.

Sadly, I had to deactivate the other gallery software I was using, but I’ll get back in there and convert those galleries to this one. If it keeps working.

Lambretta Pato 125N appears at EICMA

More to say about this later, but check out the Lambretta Pato 125N. This is the same company that’s been selling the “Chrome Verizon logo”-style generic Chinese scooter in Italy as the “Lambretta Pato” for a few years, so it’s almost surely a typical Chinese engine/frame with a plastic bodywork, like the “Venti/La Vita” is to the Vespa.

Piaggio shutters Canadian Scooter Corp.

Piaggio is abandoning the seemingly passionate, creative, and reasonable (and privately-owned) Canadian Scooter Corporation to establish a Canadian Piaggio subsidary, because short-term greed, total unfamiliarity with a market, and unsustainable dealer inflation is working so well for them here in the U.S. The “effective immediately, wait, no actually, effective a month ago” nature of the press release makes it clear that this was a decision that was carefully planned well in advance with CSC’s blessing and assistance, and that the transition will be entirely smooth and trouble free for dealers and customers. Sigh. (Thanks, Scooterism)

UPDATE: A source tells me that CSC brought the change on themselves, see the comments.

Piaggio: Googleproof!

Piaggio unveiled the new “USB” concept bike at EICMA this week. Just type “MP3″ or “USB” into Google and the first thing you get is Piaggio Scooters, right!? I look forward to the new Piaggio “BBW,” the Piaggio “The,” and the Piaggio “Britney Naked.” To be fair, the bike has some interesting points, but come ON, namers… Say What you will about the “Grand Dink” and the “Symply,” but they’re easy to find on the web.