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Harley-Davidson breaks ground on museum



By James Kelleher

Milwaukee, Wisconsin - Harley-Davidson has broken ground for a museum that, the bikemaker hopes, will become a shrine for its loyal riders and a place of conversion for a whole new generation of customers.

The museum will be built on about 10ha alongside the Menomonee River just south of centrol Milwaukee and will have cost Harley-Davidson at least $70-million by the time it opens in 2008 with revolving displays of antique motorcycles and exhibits drawn from the 103-year-old company's extensive archives.

Harley-Davidson says the 12 000 square metres facility with its restaurant, cafe, retail shop, meeting space and events rooms will probably break even financially but from a branding standpoint would pay for itself from day one by introducing whole new groups of potential buyers to the company's products Harley needs a whole new demographic of customers as the Baby Boomers die off .

That's one of Harley's biggest challenges as it struggles to find customers to replace the now ageing Baby Boomers - typically males - who have been its loyal core for decades.

The museum is seen as another step in Milwaukee's quest for revitalisation from a city of shuttered factories and breweries. Tom Barrett, the city's mayor and a man who once worked on the Harley production line, estimated the museum would generate $37-million a year for the local economy.

Harley predicted that as many as 350 000 people a year would visit the museum to see the exhibits or to attend the weddings and other events the company hopes its loyal riders will host there The museum is seen as another step in revitalising Milwaukee .

Willie Davidson, Harley's chief styling officer and grandson of co-founder William Davidson, called the museum "a tribute to all the people who stayed with us through the ups and downs".

The groundbreaking, done by nine-times AMA Grand National champion Scott Parker, sent dirt skywards from the spinning rear wheel of a Harley, and attracted a number of elected officials, one of them Wisconsin state governor Jim Doyle who predicted the museum would become "Wisconsin's Louvre". - Reuters