RECORD TURNOUT FOR RIDE TO WORK DAY

Ride to work day 2013 - great success

Despite rain over most of the country, organisers of the industry’s Ride to Work Day on 17 June claim the largest-ever measured turnout of riders. Run to encourage the wider use of bike commuting, an estimated 9200 riders took part. The figure comes from activity on the promotion’s Facebook and Twitter pages, so it is likely the actual total is substantially higher. On 19 June, two days after the promotion finished, a mile counter feature on the Ride to Work website had recorded over 30,000 miles travelled with the count still continuing.

Manufacturer and supplier support was strong. Harley-Davidson, Honda, Yamaha, Kawasaki and ZingBikes all encouraged staff to ride to work – some incentivising them with a bacon sandwich breakfast. Bikesure, Carole Nash, MCE and Bennetts were amongst the insurance companies to give their backing.

Dealers taking part included Triumph World, Chesterfield, Performance Triumph, Swindon, Fowlers of Bristol, Doble Motorcycles, Coulsdon, Surrey and West Coast Harley-Davidson, Glasgow.

Don Rutherford, boss of West Coast Harley, was satisfied with the day and probably summed up most dealers’ thoughts with the observation that the promotion works well as a general awareness campaign. “We used the day to generate local media coverage in the local press and radio. We didn’t see large numbers of bikers come through our doors on the day itself, but I didn’t expect to.

We laid on free coffee and buns, but at the end of the day, people were riding to work, and so wouldn’t have the time to visit a dealer on the same day. We don’t judge the success of Ride to Work Day on the numbers of people that come through our showroom on one day. We have reached a larger audience with an important motorcycling message and that means they could visit us tomorrow, next week or next month. As an industry, we need to promote ourselves and Ride to Work Day does a very good job of that.”

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