A company with as much legacy as Harley-Davidson has to be a cool place to work. You've got over 100 years of lineage, culture, style, and substance propelling you forward in a way that few other companies do. And there's a reason why so many of the Motor Co's employees have Harley-Davidson crest tattoos: it's because they truly love the brand.
But that same history can mean a lot of baggage. It can mean headwinds when change is necessary. And it can mean that it's hard to change course of a company as large as Harley when things aren't going your way, or when countries around the world get into trade war pissing matches. And then there's the internet, where idiotic arguments can crater sales or the stock market despite not being grounded in any sort of truth.
The bigger you are, the harder you fall.
Leading a company like Harley-Davidson has to be a mixed bag, then. The highs are high, but the lows are in the press everywhere and all being squarely blamed on your direction. This is likely why Jochen Zeitz, the company's embattled CEO, has announced that he'll be retiring from the position later this year. A move that's not at all surprising if you've been paying attention to the brand over the last year or so.
Zeitz had been on Harley-Davidson's board since the late aughts and took over the brand as CEO in 2020—a perfect time if there ever was one...
He had previously worked at Puma, the shoe and apparel company, and was known as a "turn around" executive, i.e. finding ways for struggling companies to right their ships. And, indeed, a lot of folks believed that Zeitz would be able to turn Harley's struggling economic outlook around. In the first few months on the job, Zeitz presented a five-year plan he dubbed "Hardwire" to help stabilize the company and return it to its glory. Much of it was centered around expanding into new global markets and hoping the brand's new EV company LiveWire would be able to bridge the gap between the motorcycling generations.
The former of the two worked, seeing sales skyrocket of the brand's inexpensive small-displacement motorcycles it developed in partnership with Hero, while the latter seems like an albatross around Harley's neck.
Headwinds continued, both thanks to the pandemic—in terms of manufacturing motorcycles and parts supplies—as well as trade wars that caused high tariffs to be levied on the Motor Co's overseas offerings. Likewise, the economic outlooks on many Americans took a downturn after pandemic spending dried up. No one could afford a $30,000 toy. And Harley's reticence in introducing its cheaper and smaller Hero motorcycles here in the States furthered the company's flagging sales.
Zeitz also took the brunt of positively bullshit claims of the Motor Co. being "woke," when some minor-league internet rage-baiter labeled them as such for gasp having a DEI policy. For anyone looking at the company in any real way, you could see that it was a lie and strictly a way of elevating said person's stature in that particularly annoying community. If anything, Harley needed to expand into new markets and cater more toward new riders than not. But the faux controversy caused enough of a headache that the stock price took a tumble, as well as sales.
Fast forward a few months, a new president's in office, and a second term trade war is set to absolutely hammer American products overseas, with Harley-Davidson being a principle target. Again. Honestly, it's no wonder why Zeitz is peacing out right now.
According to the brand, "The Board of Directors of Harley-Davidson, Inc. today confirmed that it is engaged in an on-going CEO search process, as part of the Board's succession planning responsibilities. The search process was initiated in Q4 2024 with the retention of a leading executive search firm after Jochen Zeitz, the current CEO, expressed his interest in retiring from the Company in 2025 after five years in the CEO position, and subject to the appointment of a suitable successor."
As for who enters the chat, that's obviously yet to be determined. I'd nominate myself, as I'm willing to get more tattoos and have a very strategic vision of what the company could do: we're stuffing that 131cu motor into a LiveWire chassis, baby! But whoever takes over will have to face a host of challenges, both in terms of the brand's lineup, its image, and finding new butts for its seats. All 700 options.
I'm not sure I'd actually want the job, but whoever it'll be, they have a lot of history they can use as motivation.
