Category: Chicago

Chicago scooter park-in: Sunday.

If you’re upset about the lack of legal scooter parking in Chicago, you’re not alone. The CHIscooterList Yahoo Group has planned a “Park In” this Sunday. The goal is to find a few consecutive parking spaces in the Loop and park one scooter in each, as per the law, for a photo shoot pointing out how ridiculous it is to not allow the sharing of parking spaces. The meeting and ride will start at The Players Club on Ashland, following the MotoGP race broadcast (the race ends around noon or 12:30). It’s a small first step in what will hopefully become an important city-wide scooter rights, advocacy, and education campaign.

The Hunnert Car Pileup

For the last few years, the Chrome Czars have organized the best hot-rod show around, the Hunnert Car Pileup. Each year it’s roughly doubled in size, and this Saturday, it will likely double again. Scooters are welcome, though only vintage scooters can enter the show area (at the discretion of the judges). The local scooter crowd usually turns out in force, and as usual, there’s a group ride planned down to the Grundy County Speedway in Morris, IL, meeting at the Krispy Kreme at Archer and Harlem (in Summit, IL) at 9am and leaving at 9:30 sharp. Weather is unpredictable this time of year, dress in layers. When you get there, look for the Galewood Cookshack (the RV with flames) for some chili (red or verde) made with their already-famous smoked pork. The show goes all day with bands, food, vendors, cars, and a Ring of Fire, and wraps up with more bands and drink at Fool’s Bar and Grill in Morris.

Slaughterhouse pre-party tonight!

Los Corazones Negros’ annual Slaughterhouse pre-party is tonight (Thursday, August 31) at Liar’s Club, 1665 W. Fullerton Ave. 9pm-til-midnight, an $8 wristband gets you free beer, Midnight-to-close, beer is only $1 DJs spin all night. 2strokebuzz will be there, running the Crapraffleâ„¢ and selling merchandise to support Scooterrelief.org.

Slaughterhouse 12 continues Friday night at Frank & Mary’s (2905 N. Elston Ave), with Karaoke and a midnight ride.

Crain’s story piques Chicago’s interest in Vespa

Stuart Luman’s story in Crain’s Chicago Business about Chicago’s lack of a Vespa dealer (2sb’s reaction) attracted a good deal of other media interest today. Along with some radio coverage and word of mouth, local culture site Chicagoist posted about the story (thanks for the link!). In a strange coincidence, the downstate Belleville News-Democrat ran a story about a sales spurt for local motorcycle dealers, including a bit about Vernon Carver of Moto Italia, the Edwardsville Vespa dealer interviewed in Luman’s story. Chicagoist’s blurb ended: “This was all just a “sky is fallingâ€? thing to see if we could make you want a Vespa. To tell you the truth, now we just want a Vespa.” Even PiaggioUSA knows, there’s no such thing as bad publicity.

Why no Chicago Vespa Dealer?

Stuart Luman of Crain’s Chicago Business explores the “Great Chicago Vespa Dealer Mystery.” 2strokebuzz talked to Stuart on several occasions about the story, to the point of probably creeping him out. The story won’t be surprising to regular 2sb readers, but Crain’s gets big props for coining the word “Vesparate.” Three points that the Crain’s story missed, in our opinion (we’re not bound by the rules of journalism or a capitalist publisher, ha):

  1. While Vespa of Chicago’s closure was a direct result of the bankruptcy of Sam Tomaino’s West Suburban Auto Group, the story does not address allegations that Tomaino intended to keep the local rights and/or sell them to a new dealer. There seems to still be some dispute over the rights, which is probably why the Olde Town Motocycle Shoppe has not officially been named the new dealer. It’s also unclear whether Piaggio approached the new OTMS/MotoplexUSA or vice versa, or how Dan Kay, the former Sales Manager of Vespa Chicago, now sales manager of OTMS, was involved.
  2. The story also does not address similar conflicts in other cities where the boutique concept was abandoned and original dealers saw their dealerships taken away, or alternately, were unable to find a buyer because of Piaggio USA’s dealer obligations.
  3. The story says Vespa of Chicago is still operating through the Diversey Boutique and is not offering service on bikes, though, as 2sb has reported, Tomaino’s Roselle location, while allegedly bare-bones, is servicing bikes, and presumably doing dealer prep for the Diversey shop, which was never a service center.

2sb has no agenda here other than curiousity, and from our conversation with Luman, neither did Crain’s, but we think the more interesting story, from a business perspective, is the failure (in many markets) of PiaggioUSA’s original upscale “boutique” marketing plan, which the current management finally seems to have to abandoned, along with some of their original big-investment dealers. 2sb lacks the sources and the resources to really follow through on this story, but a whole book will be written someday about Piaggio’s return to the US, no matter whether it’s ultimately a failure or a success.

Piaggio, Vespa scooters arrive at Old Towne Moto

2sb’er Matthew reports

Piaggio USA was just dropping off new Vespas and Piaggios at Old Towne Moto. Included in the mix was one of the Police stickered BV250s.

So despite any official word from Old Towne Motocycle Shoppe (1421 N. Wells, Chicago) or PiaggioUSA, it appears certain now that Old Towne (and presumably parent company MotoplexUSA) are Chicago’s new Vespa/Piaggio dealer. it’s still unclear whether the ex-Maywood “Vespa of Chicago” operation (now in Roselle) is an officially sanctioned dealer or service center, though 2sb reader Wezul reports they serviced his bike to his satisfaction.

Open track day at Norway

Ryan tells us there will be an open trackday this Saturday (July 8, 2006) at Norway Kart Track (the map looks vague, but you’ll see it). The track opens at 9am, and $30 buys you track time all day for scooters, pocketbikes, motards, and such. Safety wire is not required, but lights must be taped over. This is a perfect opportunity to try your bike out on a track.

Chicago-to-Lake County ride

Patrick has organized a ride for this Saturday (July 1, 2006):

Kick off the weekend right with a a nice, long, fast ride (scooters capable of 50+mph only please). Meet at Beans and Bagels on Montrose/Ravenswood at 1pm. We’ll take Route 14 to 59 to 12. Our first stop will be in Defiler SC country, at Famous Freddies Roadhouse (4pm). Jim and a few others will meet us there. Tons of really cheap decent food and beer. It’s on the fox river. If wanted we could take the barge out to Blarney’s Island the only bar in the middle of a lake that I know off. After Hanging with the Defilers (6:30pm) we will head back up to route 14 and pick up Roselle road up to Irving Park to Woodfire Chicken’s Saturday night car show (8pm) and more food if you need it. All together, this ride is about 100 miles.

2sb has big plans for that Saturday (and maybe some big news next week,) but maybe we’ll catch up with everyone at Woodfire, their car shows are always a good time.