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34 • May 5, 2014 • Powersports Business MOTORCYCLE www.PowersportsBusiness.com www.PowersportsBusiness.com MOTORCYCLE Powersports Business • May 5, 2014 • 35 CFMOTO factory rolls out first KTMR2R Duke 200 engineering at Chrysler Corp. CEO McNish handles the strategy and finance chores, while Jeff Sinclair takes on the operations and product aspects. His wife, Celia, handles the showroom and interior design, and Finkelman brings a retail specialty. Sullivan's background is private equity. Add it all up and it all up and it's recipe that has them on target to open seven AHM Indian/Victory dealerships in 2014. The group has received approval from Polaris for 15 dealership points. Next up is the east side of Cleveland, with a second store in Chicagoland likely following in Countryside. "Once we decided that we were going to do this, the next step was to decide where we were going to do it," Jeff Sinclair said. "The Midwest is over-indexed when it comes to cruisers." Locations are planned for 2014 in India- napolis, Pittsburgh and Cincinnati/Dayton. STRONG START Sinclair is high on his team and the loca- tion at the Chicago West store. The facility was built as a motorcycle dealership, first as Yamaha dealership. It most recently was an Indian dealership before Polaris relaunched the brand. In fact, a couple of employees had worked at the location previously. "It's one thing to make an investment into the brands, but the store teams are going to make or break this," he said. "And we are so blessed to have such a strong team here." They're already looking to make hires in the six-lift service department, ideally at the B or C level, according to industry consultant Duncan Butler. He and colleague Amanda Blackstone from The Butler Group Atlanta LLC set the oper- ational groundwork for the store, and generally managed the store since its January soft opening. Now, general manager George Gryparis, parts and service manager Mike Velinske, pre-owned sales manager Jason Mroz and master tech Ralph Andrade steer the dealership. Typically, the showroom will include eight pre-owned bikes, another eight Indians and 12-14 Victory units. The store's most recent order was for 16 bikes. The dealership received its license from the state of Illinois on Dec. 9, and took advantage of the timing to sell apparel during the holiday season. A pop-up store on Michigan Avenue in downtown Chicago featured Indian-only apparel and directed consumers to the dealership. While the Chicago West location offers about 12,000 square feet, most other AHM stores in the works figure to have a larger footprint, with 18,000-20,000 square feet being an ideal size. "All of our stores will be destination loca- tions," Sinclair said. "People don't drive by and say 'Hey, let's stop here. I want to buy a motorcy- cle today.' But when they do decide to buy one, we want to be as accessible as possible to those buyers. Victory and Indian are becoming major players in the motorcycle business, and we want to become a major part of that success for those brands. Let's face it, these are almost never some- body's first bike. They know what they want and they know what they like. We're here to provide the experience and the lifestyle." PSB INDIAN CONTINUED FROM PAGE 30 American Heritage Chicago West staffers joined customer Victoria Keller-Melton upon receipt of her new custom Indian Chief Vintage: (from left) Mike Farrell, sales; Ralph Andrade, service; Mike Velinske, parts and service manager; Jason Mroz, sales; and general manager George Gryparis. Check out more photos of the bike at facebook.com/PSBmagazine. The new Indian/Victory dealership includes a vinyl planking floor and the trademark Indian hearth. P30x36-PSB6-Cycle.indd 35 4/23/14 10:59 AM