BigAssMotors is trying to breathe life into TNG by taking over their distribution in the Southwest. Though TNG has seen a couple promising stretches, they’ve been plagued by Costco’s return policy, quality control issues, Schwinn, manufacturer changes, dozens of importers selling identical-looking bikes, several years of disappointment regarding the Lambretta/Scomadi/L-Series, and rumors of lapses in business ethics (notably a BBS post about their warranty manager selling warranty-returned bikes out of his garage on Craigslist). Needless to say, the announcement was less-than-enthusiastically received on the BBS. (Thanks for the link, Matt)
4 thoughts on “Are they still around?”
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You can’t polish a turd!
I sold TNG for awhile. There are many good reasons all the major shops including mine stopped selling them. Good luck to SE.
I own a TNG LS49 and can’t say enough good things about it. What sort of problems have others experienced? And what’s this about COSTCO ? I can’t imagine they would be a proper dealer and certainly would not have technicians who could service scooters. This all sounds wierd. Please can enyone shed more light?
Back around 2001, Costco sold the Vino clone that TnG imported from China. It was a bit of a running joke for a while as, as you pointed out, they had no service infrastructure and thus no business being in the scooter selling business. Costco’s liberal return policy allowed customers to return the goods when they broke down. I guess it was a bit of a fiasco. In the following years they branched out into selling through dealers and built a considerable network based on having a great price point and a ready supply of scoots. With a handful of models they kept up with parts for the LS and Vino clone (known as the Venice). Around the fall of 2003 they started to branch out and brought in the first ‘Milano’-type 150 4 stroke scooters. They were a bit of a disaster. Good in theory but they construction just didn’t follow. Then within another year their line up increased further with more 4 stroke 150 bikes than you could shake a stick and and parts support for the low quality machines plummeted. Many dealers that were happy with their simple offerings and good price point soon became disillusioned and dropped the line. The company continues to go against the common sense grain of the K.I.S.S. principle and is apparently still in business.