BREAKING

From The Editor

From The Editor’s Desk – February ’08 Issue

Front Cover

More Than Just A Trend For Most Of Us

It never ceases to amaze me how many people follow trends. I mean, I have had my share so I’m not one to bitch, but for the most part I find what I like and I stick with it. It seems like the motorcycle industry today is jumping from trend to trend in an attempt to revitalize a sluggish sales forecast and from that we have had a hectic year of bobbers…. no, no, now it’s board trackers…… no, no, now it’s baggers, all leaving the average cat bored with our circus-like antics….. “Step right up ladies and gentlemen, see the eight wonders of the motorcycle world. We have bikes with long front ends, bikes with fat tires, bikes for racing, bikes for collecting, see them all for one low admission price but hurry in today… before you know it, these attractions will be replaced by new acts and they may be lost forever……” Ladies and gentlemen please! (Sorry, had to steal that lyric for this one) If no one else has realized this, we are not now, nor have we in a long time come up with any real new trend. Sure, we have developed a few new ways of building bikes, some of the innovations are fresh but for the most part, we’re just rehashing the past.

   I started to think about this the other day when someone told me that Street Chopper Magazine, one of my favorite mags I might add, was going down to only two issues a year. This person’s ridiculous insight was
   “Yeah, choppers are dead man, baggers are the new trend.” Okay clear the room cause I feel the need to scream!!!!   
  Hear this man and  hear it well, choppers will never die, they may go through many changes, sometimes being more expensive, sometimes fatter, sometimes not, but as long as there are stock bikes that look average there will be cats who take them home and CHOP THEM!
   Don’t get me wrong, I own and love my bagger, I’ve also had a few choppers, a couple stock antique bikes and each one was special to me but not because it got me into some secret fraternity of other upstanding young men who owned the same brand and model as I did. No, that’s the exact world I was trying to escape through motorcycling. I can’t imagine that this thing that started as a statement of independence has come down to an audience whose opinion can be swayed by trend, or the report of one. Yes, baggers are popular right now, they have been before and there are many good new products for them. Does this mean that choppers will disappear forever? No, this just means that the average age of motorcycle riders has advanced to a point where a bagger is more practical on a whole.

Related Posts

1 of 20