Dutch motorcycle registration at highest level since 2009The latest data released by BOVAG/RAI/RDC (the Dutch motorcycle industry trade association consortium) shows that motorcycle registrations in the Netherlands were +9.9 percent (11,878 units) for the first 10 months of 2016 – more than 1,000 units up on the same period of 2015.
In fact, after 10 months, 2016 has already seen more new motorcycles sold there than was the case for the full year in 2015.
By way of comparative reference, in 2009 the number of new motorcycles sold in the Netherlands was 14,790, while the average market total in the 15 years before was almost 17,000 units per year.
In 2013, motorcycle sales reached an all-time low of 9,335 units, but since then the market is growing, with an approximately 1,000 units, or 10 percent a year growth rate.
This year has seen BMW’s traditional grip on the Dutch market challenged – with Yamaha taking over market leadership after the first 10 months with 1,794 units sold, an increase of around 9 percent year-on-year.
BMW is second with 1,756 units (+2.3 percent); Kawasaki third (1,460 units, +18.9 percent); Honda fourth (1,438 units, +29.8 percent) and Suzuki fifth (1,158 units, +2.8 per cent).
As at November 1st 2016, the total number of motorcycles registered for road use in the Netherlands (the total “bike park”) stood at a record number of 720,889 motorcycles. That is nearly 4,000 units more than a year ago, more than twice as many as 20 years ago (335,000) and almost six times as many as in 1986, when the Netherlands had just 124,000 motorcycles.
In the last 30 years it is not just the numbers of motorcycles on the road in the Netherlands that has changed out of all recognition. A very high proportion of the motorcycles on the road there in the 1980s were either small cc machines such as mopeds and scooters (especially following a 1960s scooter boom there) and, still, restored WL45 unused war surplus Harley-Davidsons (“Liberators”) that were “liberated” from the Antwerp docks in Belgium in the summer of 1945 after WWII had ended, before they had seen active service!
Dutch ‘Bike Park’
- 1976: 68,700
- 1986: 124, 000
- 1996: 335, 000
- 2006: 616,282
- 2016: 720 889*
