Erik Buell's Second Chance, Erik Buell Racing, Files For Receivership
Erik Buell Racing filed for receivership last week, but Buell himself has vowed to reorganize and give it another try (if he can).
After failing to secure the necessary funding to keep the East Troy, Wisconsin motorcycle firm afloat, Erik Buell Racing has filed for Chapter 128 receivership “with the winning bid to be determined by a state court,” reports the Milwauee Wisconsin Journal Sentinal.
According to a Facebook post on the EBR page, Buell will try to “best maximize the value from EBR to benefit all.”
Thank you for the supportive posts, texts, and e-mails since the announcement that EBR has ceased operations. This is a difficult time, and your comments mean a great deal to me personally and also to the EBR team that has done such amazing work over the past few, intense years.
No doubt, it was an incredible ride, feeling like the longest qualifying lap ever. And, then, just when we knew we were about to set an all-time record, we tossed it in the last corner…
Keeping with racing analogies, now we need to get back on the track and look ahead remembering all the things we were doing right around so many turns.
Unfortunately, in the end, we tried to do too much with too little funding, but it doesn’t diminish the accomplishments. We introduced the world class American super bikes of 1190RS, 1190RX and 1190SX, while at the same time doing revolutionary work for Hero on the HX250R, Leap, SimplEcity, iON, RnT and many others, plus concepts never publicly seen. It was great EBR innovation and design, and introduced new technology to Hero and its suppliers to provide a real kick start for them. But in the end all of this simply overwhelmed us, and for that we are sorry and saddened.
I want you to know that looking ahead my focus is 100% on helping the receiver best maximize the value from EBR to benefit all, and I will make every possible effort to get the new organization to where it can support the dealers and customers first, and then help find investment to get back to full throttle.
Thank you for your support, it means a great deal. Please stay tuned – I cannot predict the future, but always believe the best is yet to come.
Erik
EBR’s move into receivership leaves 126 former employees without jobs and the company’s website offline for the time being.
[Editor’s note: I know this isn’t car news and may not be up TTAC’s alley. But, there’s a big reason why I wrote about this today.
Erik is one of the good guys. Firstly, he’s probably one of the most talented and innovative motorcycle engineers in America, if not the world. He truly cares about his employees and, I’m certain, if there was anything he could do to stop this, he would.
But, most importantly, even during the days when H-D owned the first motorcycle company bearing his name, he would go out of his way to make himself personally available to customers. I own a Buell. I have Erik on Facebook. In the past, I have asked him questions about my bike and he’s always answered. Who else does that? Nobody. That’s what makes Erik and his creations so great.]
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Good bikes but they don't hold their value well, there was a very clean example at one of our Harley dealers last fall, it was on the floor for ~$2,500 iirc. Possibly there's a concern about part availability. Not my cup of tea but for the price it seemed like a steal. I'll take the softtail slim myself.
I've always liked Buell and hope he recovers, (somehow?) but he's a Niche player in a Niche market. It's sad, because I think he'd be 'successful' as an ultra-low-volume manufacturer (like Confederate) but it wouldn't support his goals for racing. He's basically been building track-day bikes for years, and they are EXPENSIVE. Probably never a better time to pick up a Lightning though.