Indian Dropped By Staten Island Dealer

STATEN ISLAND, NY – Gotham Motorcycles plans to expand the presence of Royal Enfield in its showroom and is looking to perhaps add other motorcycle lines in the wake of jettisoning the Indian and Slingshot brands of motorcycles and three-wheeled roadsters from Polaris in mid-November.

“No longer Indian. No longer Slingshot,” Gotham Motorcycles general manager Joe Vitale confirmed in a phone conversation this afternoon. While he declined to go into details on the parting, he said, “We are doing it amicably.”

The relationship between Gotham Motorcycles and Polaris goes back years. Before picking up Indian, the store sold Victory motorcycles from Polaris prior to its shuttering of that brand in 2017.

“We are currently talking to other manufacturers,” Vitale said without providing names.

While Vitale wouldn’t get into specifics about the split, it is known that Indian has had difficulty providing product and parts during the COVID-19 pandemic, with no notion of when delivery of new units might rebound.

The brand is not alone. Visits to various dealerships across a variety of brands in recent weeks have revealed low inventories and cases where numerous models are lacking entirely.

Energica Getting Another Dealer In New York

One brand that Gotham Motorcycles won’t be selling down the road are the high-end Energica electric models from Italy. Energica announced late last week that it has picked up a half-dozen more dealers in the United States, including one in “New York.”

The company didn’t provide any dealer identities. RIDE-CT & RIDE-New England inquired and a company rep responded with the explanation that the name of the new dealer in the region is being withheld until a demo model can be dispatched to the store. He did reveal the new dealer is “in NYC.”

Energica already has a dealer in the Hudson Valley – Hudson Valley Motorcycles in Ossining, NY.

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