How Much???
#11
08-30-1999, 12:48 PM
I agree that today's ATV's are inline with inflation and are worth the money, what kills me is the price of after market parts. You can easily spend an additional $1000.00 to $2000.00 on performance parts, and not to mention just replacing stock parts like starters , I'm sorry, no electric starter that fits on any ATV should cost $250+++. Like stated above!! "It's better than picking weeds on Sunday", spend the money, have fun, you only live once.
TXwarrior
TXwarrior
#12
08-30-1999, 10:24 PM
In 1987 I purchased a brand new King Quad 4x4 for exactly 3000 dollars out the door,taxes included.In 1997,my brother bought a 97 KQ,the only changes in 10 yrs to that quad, were,250cc up to 280cc,and from totally air cooled to installing an oil cooler,BIG DEAL.And the price for the 97 was 5500 dollars.The manufactures will get whatever supply and demand allow them to.I to am utterly pissed at the price of parts.40 dollars PER WHEEL for brakes for my 99 Sportsman,Ridicules.I just installed a rear wheel bearing on my bro's KQ,30 dollars for the bearing,10 bucks for a stinking seal.I can purchase brakes ALL THE WAY AROUND on my car for 40 bucks.I have 8000 dollars invested in my 99 Sportsman,but what are we to do,if we want something bad enough,we'll pay the price.Yes it Irks me,but whats a QUADALHOLIC to do?--BILL
#13
08-31-1999, 11:26 AM
ECONOMIES OF SCALE
With all the moaning and complaining about purchase price and replacement parts costs, it seems a little lesson in Econ 101 is in order.
When a manufacturer, like Ford or GM for example, makes millions of identical vehicles, and millions more of nearly identical sister vehicles, wherein many common utility function parts are shared across product lines and model years, it is possible to sell those vehicles and parts at just slightly above cost and still make a profit.
The sole reason anyone is in business, including the laborer putting left front wheels on Ford Escorts who sells his time to Ford, is to make a profit. It is more profitable for Joe Sixpack to wield a lug wrench 8 hours a day, than it is for him to sit and watch TV. Just like Ford or GM, or anybody else, he’s in it for the money. Profit is not a dirty word despite what the liberals in media and academia would like to have you believe. Profit is what makes it possible for you to buy a quad, or anything else for that matter. I doubt that you go to work everyday out of the goodness of your heart. You expect a paycheck for your efforts... and so does the other guy.
Last year I put front brakes on my Lincoln Town Car for PA state inspection. Two sets of disc pads cost $23. I also put front brakes on my Kawasaki Concours street bike. Two sets of disc pads, with all four disc pads containing no more material than a single disc pad for my Lincoln, cost $45.
There are far more Lincoln Town Cars than there are Kawasakis all put together. The brake pads that fit my long gone ’79 Town Car are the same ones that fit my ’89 Town Car, they also fit the Mercury Grand Marquis and the Ford Crown Victoria. When I go to the mall, my Town Car is perhaps one of a dozen or more present at any given time. When I go to the Shrine Poker Run, the only place I can think of where you can see 800 to 1000 bikes at once, my Concours is the only one. I have attended every Shrine Poker Run since the Fall ’89 run. In all that time, I have only ever seen one other Concours. In fact, I’ve probably seen more Rolls Royces on the road than I have seen Kawasaki Concours.
Since motorcycles, and to an even greater degree quads, are in a sense items of specialty manufacture, in that they are not cranked out in cookie cutter fashion by the millions. It is entirely reasonable that brakes, starters, and other parts cost what they do. If you think an after market performance exhaust system costs “too much”, then try making one yourself. How much in the way of material, and more importantly time, do you think you would require to do the job? Better yet, start your own company and see if like Meineke you can make a living selling them for $19.95. See if you can get George Foreman (“You’re not gonna pay a lot for this muffler”) to pitch them for you for cheap.
If a company makes zillions of widgets a year, it is possible for them to recover the cost of production, plus make a profit, by selling those widgets for just a few pennies over cost. If a company makes only a handful of widgets a year, then they must sell them at a significant mark-up just to break even. It is called economy of scale.
Mass production and economy of scale, these are what made yesterday’s luxuries, things once only affordable by the very rich like automobiles, into commodity items within the reach of almost everyone. And the spin off of mass production technology to specialty manufacture is the only thing that makes quads, and many other low volume non-essential items, toys by any other name, available at any price.
Army Man
With all the moaning and complaining about purchase price and replacement parts costs, it seems a little lesson in Econ 101 is in order.
When a manufacturer, like Ford or GM for example, makes millions of identical vehicles, and millions more of nearly identical sister vehicles, wherein many common utility function parts are shared across product lines and model years, it is possible to sell those vehicles and parts at just slightly above cost and still make a profit.
The sole reason anyone is in business, including the laborer putting left front wheels on Ford Escorts who sells his time to Ford, is to make a profit. It is more profitable for Joe Sixpack to wield a lug wrench 8 hours a day, than it is for him to sit and watch TV. Just like Ford or GM, or anybody else, he’s in it for the money. Profit is not a dirty word despite what the liberals in media and academia would like to have you believe. Profit is what makes it possible for you to buy a quad, or anything else for that matter. I doubt that you go to work everyday out of the goodness of your heart. You expect a paycheck for your efforts... and so does the other guy.
Last year I put front brakes on my Lincoln Town Car for PA state inspection. Two sets of disc pads cost $23. I also put front brakes on my Kawasaki Concours street bike. Two sets of disc pads, with all four disc pads containing no more material than a single disc pad for my Lincoln, cost $45.
There are far more Lincoln Town Cars than there are Kawasakis all put together. The brake pads that fit my long gone ’79 Town Car are the same ones that fit my ’89 Town Car, they also fit the Mercury Grand Marquis and the Ford Crown Victoria. When I go to the mall, my Town Car is perhaps one of a dozen or more present at any given time. When I go to the Shrine Poker Run, the only place I can think of where you can see 800 to 1000 bikes at once, my Concours is the only one. I have attended every Shrine Poker Run since the Fall ’89 run. In all that time, I have only ever seen one other Concours. In fact, I’ve probably seen more Rolls Royces on the road than I have seen Kawasaki Concours.
Since motorcycles, and to an even greater degree quads, are in a sense items of specialty manufacture, in that they are not cranked out in cookie cutter fashion by the millions. It is entirely reasonable that brakes, starters, and other parts cost what they do. If you think an after market performance exhaust system costs “too much”, then try making one yourself. How much in the way of material, and more importantly time, do you think you would require to do the job? Better yet, start your own company and see if like Meineke you can make a living selling them for $19.95. See if you can get George Foreman (“You’re not gonna pay a lot for this muffler”) to pitch them for you for cheap.
If a company makes zillions of widgets a year, it is possible for them to recover the cost of production, plus make a profit, by selling those widgets for just a few pennies over cost. If a company makes only a handful of widgets a year, then they must sell them at a significant mark-up just to break even. It is called economy of scale.
Mass production and economy of scale, these are what made yesterday’s luxuries, things once only affordable by the very rich like automobiles, into commodity items within the reach of almost everyone. And the spin off of mass production technology to specialty manufacture is the only thing that makes quads, and many other low volume non-essential items, toys by any other name, available at any price.
Army Man
