BMW Motorrad is the third Euro manufacturer to announce record sales numbers in the past week.
BMW says it sold 145,032 bikes and scooters in 2016, up from 136,963 units the previous year. According to the company, this means it’s had 50 per cent sales growth over the past six years, and it’s on track to sell 200,000 machines annually by 2020.
In the past week, Triumph North America and Ducati have also both announced sales gains for 2016. It’s a trend we’ve watched over the past few years: While North American motorcycles sales haven’t been as robust as they were before the 2008 crash, the rest of the globe is buying like crazy. And even here in North America, higher-end bikes are still doing quite well.
But Ducati and BMW all seem to be planning for the future, as each brand has released some sort of budget bike in the past couple years — the Scrambler line from Ducati, the G310 platform from BMW. With the 310 models expected to appear in BMW showrooms en masse in 2017, at very attractive pricing, we’re guessing next year will see a much bigger jump in Beemer sales.
