Category: Manufacturers

Honda Elite Returns for 2010

It’s Honda News day: The venerable Honda Elite will return for 2010, but in name only, it appears to be a rebadged Honda Lead 110. I never thought I’d be saying this, but as out-of-date as the original Elite design was, it’s 25 years old and thus ripe for nostalgia. As Eric points out at Modern Buddy (thanks for the tip, Eric!), the least they could do is give it a pop-up headlight. Devo has a new album coming out and Lou Reed’s playing Lollapalooza this year. Grace Jones, Adam Ant, and Jim McMahon aren’t too busy lately, let’s get the old gang together!

The New Stella, unveiled

newstella1
For more than a year, rumors have been circulating about a new 4-stroke version of Genuine Scooter Company’s Stella motorscooter. Genuine confirmed the model a few months ago, but has otherwise been very quiet about the project. This week, Genuine allowed 2strokebuzz a quick look at a “New Stella” prototype (and a ride!) just before it was sent for CARB testing in California.
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The Vespa Experiment

Vespanomics is in motion for the Vespa Experiment, in which three singer-songwriters are in the midst of a Vespa tour of California nightclubs and coffee bars. A solid idea, everyone loves acoustic folk peppered with pseudo-environmental PiaggioUSA talking points, until you hear raging bullshit like (take it away, Paolo!):

“If the 69% of Americans who own two or more cars would just switch one set of four wheels for two, the reduction in fuel consumption, emissions, congestion and cost would be significant – not years from now, but right now,”

So all we need to do is immediately and permanently change the transportation habits of a mere 69% of Americans? If only America’s 21 million 2-or-more-car households* bought a scooter (a Vespa, natch), we’d se a significant change?

Am I cynical? Am I a big hater? No. That’s just a ridiculous dream.

Piaggio sold 15 million Vespas worldwide between 1946 and 1996. VespaUSA bragged a few years ago that with new plants in Brazil and Asia, they could supply the American market with 1 million scooters a year, even that was a pipe dream, seeing as how the MIC reported that only 222,000 scooters were sold in the U.S. 2008, the best year for scooter sales in decades.

(Feel free to quote those numbers if you go to one of the shows.)

Also, here’s a bit more detail on Vespa’s Pandora music channels (is that ANOTHER ad agency?) and news that Vespa’s doing a promo tie-in with that sad new Da Vinci Code-prequel.

*The exact number here is arguable, but we’re probably being more conservative than Timoni. First, we’re assuming he’s talking about households, not individuals, it’s ludicrous to think 65% of Americans own two cars personally. We found stats citing 21 million multi-car households in the U.S in 2005, and went with that. If Timoni’s “69%” was applied to all US households (105.5 million in 2000), that would mean 72.5 million multi-car households. We’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and stick with 21 million rather than 72.5 million. Or! Maybe he meant “69% of the Americans” rather than “the 69% of Americans,” that would get him down to only 15 million scooters. The gist remains the same.

Prima Pullman Jacket review

8738Over the past few years it’s been great to see scooterists finally getting more concerned about safety and wearing protective gear, and it’s hard to say which is the cause and which is the effect, but at the same time we’ve seen more scooter-specific gear becoming available.

You could argue that there’s no specific difference between a motorcycle jacket and a scooter jacket, and you’d be absolutely right. The demands of either are pretty similar, and any of the thousands of motorcycle jackets out there would certainly protect you equally on a scooter or motorycle. The difference is fashion. 10 years ago, your choice consisted of three varieties: The too-colorful leather “Power Ranger,” the leather classic “Biker,” and the hundred-zipper Scotchbrite-and-black-fabric “Tech.”
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LML Star Deluxe for Italy

LML launched their Star Deluxe 125 and 150 in Italy this week (Google translation). As we all know, the Genuine Stella is based on the LML Star, and a “new” California-legal Stella 150 is expected to arrive in U. S. soon, but these appear to be more or less the same models available in Europe for some time (though has the Star always been Euro3 compliant?) Still, there might be a few colors and options within that story to fuel the rumor mill.

Philip McCaleb has confirmed the new Stellas will feature 150cc 4-stroke engines, and despite the wacky predictions we’ve heard (and spread), we suspect they won’t be otherwise wildly distinctive from the currently-available Stella 150. Still, that’s good news for Californians (and the environment,) and California compliance will likely allow Genuine to import and market the Stella on a larger scale.

Piaggio targets Continental Airlines

airportNo, Roberto Colannino isn’t looking to acquire another airline,* Piaggio USA is marketing directly to Continental employees in Newark, NJ as part of a Continental Airlines alternative-transportation program featuring designated scooter parking and giveaways. It’s actually a pretty neat idea, though it might be tough to implement on a wider scale.

*It’s easy to forget that the Vespa’s roots are in aviation. Piaggio Aero (an entirely separate company, but still bearing the Piaggio name) still makes airplanes. It’s odd that with all of the news about Colannino’s acquisition of Alitalia, that factoid never came up.