Brand Loyalty

I believe that brand communities like Harley Davidson are the ultimate goal for niche brands. Harley Davidson represents a characteristic that separates them from their competition. That is that they are for the "tough guys" and the "don't-care-just-want-to-ride-crowd." After realizing that they have a certain crowd that buys their product they decided to have these Posse Rides. They knew that this could be successful because they were having people who had common lifestyles come together. It is their normal just like people who buy apple products have common ideas or opinions on products. So this Posse Ride is an amazing idea to bring people together to build an everlasting brand loyalty that can bring lots of profits to the company. The fact that you have to take an oath to join is that much better. This gets the riders feeling involved. They can say that they are apart of something, and that they love it. Harley Davidson has done enough with the ride that they don't need to get involved. The riders are doing the work which makes them feel that much better about it. If someone feels involved in the decision making then they are most likely to do it with more passion. With that in mind, Harley needs to help the riders, but let the riders do most of the work. I feel as if Harley Davidson has done everything to bring brand loyalty, but it is it at the same brand loyalty level as say, apple? Probably not because no company can mess things up and its customers will forget about it quite like apple. But Harley Davidson has done enough to keep the people riding.