Motor-cycle slump ahead

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33965, 4 October 1975, Page 21

Motor-cycle slump ahead

(N.Z. Press Association) I WELLINGTON. I -Motor-cycle dealers are bracing themselves I for a big slump in sales late this year. ! Higher freight costs for' motor-cycles from Japan and; the effects of last month’s! devaluation will send prices, soaring about December. A member of the Moton ■Trade Association’s motori cycle committee, Mr Don! Boyle, said today that the price increases would aver-! age between 15 and 20 per! ,cent. Some increases would be! I larger. Mr Boyle said a Su-l zuki GT3BO would increase: j by nearly $5OO to $lBOO. j Motor-cycle dealers have: been experiencing a small! boom since the 15 per cent! devaluation of the dollar. “New sales have been; going mad since the deva-] duation,” Mr Boyle said. 1 New motor-cycle sales in August totalled 2700 — i which was well above the! year’s monthly average of about 1500. New motor-cycle registrations for the eight months! until the end of August] totalled 12,700. “We will probably get! about 18,000 sales for the! year, which is well down on! the 1973 figure of 28,000,”! Mr Boyle said. I

I Motor-cycle dealers were (recovering from last year’s | sales slump only in recent months. “There will be quite ( a customer resistance when ' the prices go up and it • could be next summer before they get back to reality.” ‘ Mr Boyle said he would ;ask the Government to reduce sales tax on motor--cycles, at next week’s annual conference of the [Motor Trade Association ! “The Government savs motor-cycles should be on the same rate of dutv as ’(cars, yet we are on a flat 40 [ per cent while small cars are on 30 per cent." “I think the government hits bikes a bit too hard. In view of the oil crisis, bikes (should be encouraged.”