Polk Audio = Harley Davidson?

mrbigbluelight

jdhdiggs wrote: »

Come on Bob, he was just pointing out that one product is a great bang for the buck product and the other is made by people thinking that $30/hr isn't enough to push a botton 2,000 times a day making it an overpriced albatross driving the companies profitability into the crapper, that's all he was saying.

No, I think he was pointing out that the difference is one company, American automobile manufacturers, have "managers" that don't listen to their marketplace and have no real concept or interest in what they're doing, and the other company, Polk, ......... does.

One has clueless bean counters, the other has leaders.

Both have factory floor workers who are skilled and are capable of producing a fine product given the correct leadership.

Yeah ..... I think that's what he was pointing out.

:rolleyes:

Didn't AMF make bowling balls ?

rskarvan

Harley-Davidson Inc. met its shipment target of 317,000 motorcycles for 2004 and posted its 19th straight year of earnings and revenue growth.

The Milwaukee-based motorcycle manufacturer shipped 317,289 units last year, and growth is expected to continue into 2005 as Harley management reaffirmed its shipment target of 339,000 bikes.

For the fourth quarter, Harley posted net income of the $209 million, or 71 cents per share, an increase of 14.5 percent compared with $182.4 million, or 60 cents per share, for the same period a year ago. Net sales for the quarter were $1.22 billion, up 5.4 percent from $1.16 billion.

Analysts polled by First Call were expected earnings of 69 cents per share on average.

Fourth-quarter retail sales of Harley bikes grew 6.7 percent in the United States and increased 14 percent in international markets, said Harley-Davidson chairman and chief executive officer Jeffrey Bleustein. The company sold 80,587 units in the quarter, resulting in revenue of $992.6 million, up 5 percent compared with last year.

For the year, Harley reported net income of $889.8 million, or $3 per share, up 16.9 percent compared with $760.9 million, or $2.50 per share, the year before. Net sales grew 8.5 percent to $5.02 billion from $4.62 billion.

Retail sales of motorbikes for the year were $3.9 billion, with 7.1 percent growth in sales in the United States and 1.5 percent growth in international markets. International sales grew in all regions with the exception of Europe, where retail sales fell 5 percent for the year.

Bleustein said it will cut prices of its bikes in Europe for 2005 to offset market conditions and the strong value of the euro.

Harley-Davidson said it is on track to ship 400,000 units in 2007 and generate annual percentage earnings growth in the mid-teens.

TroyD

If you want a lesson in cultivating brand loyalty....HD is the benchmark.

BDT

jdhdiggs

R: I had no idea they were made in York, PA!
MBBL: Go on a tour sometime and tell me how skilled those workers are (most literally push a button a couple thousand times a day and get payed $48-60K/yr to do it). When the production lines were redesinged here in York and the KC facilities. Every effort was made to ensure that as little skill as possible is in play for the employees. I don't know about the power train operations facility in WI. That's partially how they fixed their quality issues. BTW: Did you just call Matt Polk a "clueless bean counter"?

Troy: Them and Bose.

steveinaz

Unions do nothing more and nothing less than force big money to share in the profits fairly. If you have a problem with unions, you either: a) are simply envious; b) need to take an economics 101 course to understand that we ALL benefit from unions; c) one of the greedy and/or benefactors of cheap skilled labor. Do you really think the average working joe could make decent living if it wasn't for the personnel-pay competition that the very unions you insult, provide?

Stop hating because a group of people have made a stand. No need to worry anyway, America is dumbing up enough that soon there will be no unions---and we'll all (except you executive types) be making what the "company" dictates---and since there are plenty of illegal immigrants that will be more than happy to take your job at $1.85/hr; the corporations will be very, very happy to see you go.

Although I am a conservative, this is one area where America cuts off its nose, despite its face. I am also generally pro free market, but with some caveats--talk for another thread....

WilliamM2

Demiurge wrote: »

They're stuck in the 80s and most talk **** because they don't own one.

And Harley is stuck in the 60's.;)

shack

steveinaz wrote:

Unions do nothing more and nothing less than force big money to share in the profits fairly. If you have a problem with unions, you either: a) are simply envious; b) need to take an economics 101 course to understand that we ALL benefit from unions; c) one of the greedy and/or benefactors of cheap skilled labor. Do you really think the average working joe could make decent living if it wasn't for the personnel-pay competition that the very unions you insult, provide?

Stop hating because a group of people have made a stand. No need to worry anyway, America is dumbing up enough that soon there will be no unions---and we'll all (except you executive types) be making what the "company" dictates---and since there are plenty of illegal immigrants that will be more than happy to take your job at $1.85/hr; the corporations will be very, very happy to see you go.

Although I am a conservative, this is one area where America cuts off its nose, despite its face. I am also generally pro free market, but with some caveats--talk for another thread....

Unions are a drain on the business and industrial core of this country. They are the poster boy for everything that is wrong with American business. I'm not jealous, I make more than most union workers WITHOUT anyone reperesenting me but myself, I have a Finance/Economics degree and understand full well the "role" of unions and yes, the average joe could certainly make a decent wage for his/her family without the unions.

NO unions....A GOOD THING!

jdhdiggs

Why should someone force "force" people to share in the profits fairly comrade? Did the worker put up the working capital? Did they design the product? Take the risk? Or did they just show up for an agreed upon period of time for an agreed upon wage to do an agreed upon job? Why should they turn around and try to destroy the person who provided their job in the name of "fairness"?

Edit:

Dabnabit Shack, always on top of things.... BTW, I did make quite a bit of money on my market timing the last two weeks!

Also, to not be so nasty...

bobman1235

To be fair, Steve - I love the idea behind Unions, that being labor organizing to get their fair wages. I don't like what unions have become, which is a way to strongarm companies into ridiculous demands. Every construction worker I know is in a Union, and the crap they get away with is ridiculous. Not just their pay, which I could try and justify, but the fact that they CAN'T be fired, even when they just decide not to show up for work for a week. I'm all for the people having power, I'm not any more for them abusing it than I am for a corporation abusing it.

MSALLA

steveinaz wrote: »

Unions do nothing more and nothing less than force big money to share in the profits fairly.

We use union labor at our place and I have nothing against unions but this is not really true. All a company dose is raise what they charge a customer to cover the higher union labor rates. Infact, the"big money" company really makes more profit because they are marking up a higher labor rate by the same % they would mark up the lower non-union rate.

40% of $50 per hour is alot more then 40% 0f $18 per hour.

Sami

steveinaz wrote: »

Unions do nothing more and nothing less than force big money to share in the profits fairly.

Isn't that the basic idea of communisms? While it's a good idea and has some success in the right places, in the long run it doesn't work (as demonstrated by CCCP).

jdhdiggs

bobman1235 wrote: »

To be fair, Steve - I love the idea behind Unions, that being labor organizing to get their fair wages. I don't like what unions have become, which is a way to strongarm companies into ridiculous demands. Every construction worker I know is in a Union, and the crap they get away with is ridiculous. Not just their pay, which I could try and justify, but the fact that they CAN'T be fired, even when they just decide not to show up for work for a week. I'm all for the people having power, I'm not any more for them abusing it than I am for a corporation abusing it.

I totally agree with this. Making sure that you have safe working environments and a liveable wage is one thing, thinking that you have the right to work (regardless of ability or performance) and that the workers should control the fate and direction of the company is something else entirely.

steveinaz

If everyone played "fair" there wouldn't be a need for unions. Think about it. There's alot of Urban legend floating around about unions. My dad was union sheet metal worker for 47 years. If he didn't show up to work--he didn't get paid--PERIOD. If he didn't show up to work for a week, he got fired (except of course for a STRIKE). I see many of you have bitten on the propaganda corporate America throws out there: "Poor us, these mean unions take all of our profit, so we're gonna have to triple the price of your car..." Yeah, boo-**** hoo.

Power to the people baby.

jdhdiggs

Who deifines "fair"? WTH do you mean by "fair"? Don't the employee's agree to work for a wage? How's that not fair?

Please explain how this works in your econ101 since this logic is like nothing I've ever seen before.

bobman1235

Calling it logic is a bit of a stretch, no?

shack

steveinaz wrote:

I see many of you have bitten on the propaganda corporate America throws out there: "Poor us, these mean unions take all of our profit, so we're gonna have to triple the price of your car..." Yeah, boo-**** hoo.

Power to the people baby.

We live in a capitalistic economy....where the people who put up the capital and take the risk and reap the rewards of that risk. If everyone just went out looking for a paycheck there would be no jobs...except of course for government jobs...since no one would open businesses when there is no chance for profit over and above "the minimum". Better to invest somewhere else where the reward is commensurate with the risk.

Power to the people....sure...it's called socialism and is the very foundation of unions.

Employees can have all the control they want over a business. Put up the capital, own all the stock and they can have ALL the control and ALL the profit....and ALL the risk. Unions want it all...except of course...the risk.

Systems

Everything we are talking about here in this thread and others right now is all circular logic. The simple fact is that we need them all and they all help us and hurt us. The relationships between things like unions and corporations has to be symbiotic because if something is misbalanced, the corporation gets screwed by the union or the workers themselves (non-union) get screwed by the corporation. Both sides have been proven to screw the other if things aren’t balanced. Same with workers off seas. McDonalds wouldn’t be able to give our kids Bee movie toys in their happy meals if they were being made by an American worker expecting a living wage of $35000 a year to do it Vs a Chinese factory where their living wage is $1000. I would still prefer having 1000 corp headquarters guys in the USA making on average $150000 a year and 100000 factory workers in China making $1000 a year.

Its all a balance and we can argue that one is better then the other but its all circular logic. By and large, in the USA this stuff is BALANCED as you can tell since our economy is still doing just fine and dandy along a normal up and down trend.



Right now, the American auto comportations are getting screwed by the union that in the ends screws themselves... I just dont get that. Dont they all need each other to survive, I just dont get that union. A good example of a symbotic huge corporation and huge union is the Teamsters and UPS. That relationship just works.

PolkThug

Unions aren't the problem with big corporations. IMO, corporations have the same huge problem many consumers have, they borrow too much $, then get burned. If corporations would use profits instead of loans to expand business, there would be less problems. However, the downside is that it takes much more time to grow the business.

steveinaz

jdhdiggs wrote: »

Who deifines "fair"? WTH do you mean by "fair"? Don't the employee's agree to work for a wage? How's that not fair?

Please explain how this works in your econ101 since this logic is like nothing I've ever seen before.

Fair as in:

If you are a huge coporate success, pay your people better. You didn't get there by yourself, you got there on the backs of your employees---share some of the wealth.

As far as "employee's agree to work for a wage" that's not a fairness test. People "agree" to work, because they need work--the wage may or may not be "fair."

Average American Executives make 475 times more than the "floor" workers (still want to talk fair?): http://www.pbs.org/now/politics/executivepay06.html

jdhdiggs

Yes, what skills, money, leadership, etc... did that "floor" worker bring to the table that couldn't be immediately replaced by virtually anyone off the street? Try that with a CEO (regardless of what people think of the typical CEO's competancy).

Besides, CEO's DON'T own the company, you and I do. They get paid by the same implired agreement the floor worker does. I know that a mom and pop owned business does not have have a 475x pay multiplier. So again, were is all this corporate greed?