New Harley-Davidson CEO talks climb to the top

ELMIRA, N.Y. — Matt Levatich, president and CEO of Harley-Davidson (HOG), returned to familiar highways for the grand opening of the Finger Lakes Harley-Davidson dealership near here. The 50-year-old Ithaca, N.Y., native talked about his journey in the company, his new position and his Ithaca roots. The interview has been edited for length.

Question: Describe the first motorcycle you ever rode.

Answer: The first motorcycle I ever rode was a 125 CC dirt bike in the early '70s when I was about 8, and I rode that motorcycle until I got my car license so maybe eight years with my neighborhood friends in the fields and forests where I grew up …

Q: Did you dabble in any mechanics while at Ithaca High School?

A: Not in the high school itself. It was a different time. We had shop class in middle school. ... I had a Volkswagen Beetle when I was around 16 that I was trying to get running. My dad was helping with brakes and things. The closest class I had with engineering was a mechanical drawing class ... it was a great class that helped me transition into the idea of design — from fixing things to designing things.

It was part of the stimulus for me going into mechanical engineering because it was about mechanical things how they work, why they don't work, how to make them better, and bringing in technical skills in math and physics that I was also strong in. It was sort of an obvious progression. It made sense. I had a particular interest in manufacturing. I have always enjoyed factories and how things were made. So I had the product interest, the design interest and the technical aptitude.

Q: Did you start out (at Harley-Davidson) on the bottom rung?

A: So I started as a manufacture project engineer, so in a way, similar to what I was doing prior to business school. But with a different development program in the company ... it's an earn-your-stripe sort of role ... but I moved from that position as part of the rotation into the support part of the business and was put on a project that the legal team was running addressing expected changes in European distribution laws because of the European unions so this was 1995 and the EU was being formed. ...

It was very interesting to me. … but, again, connecting the business to the marketplace and that pretty quickly led to an opportunity to move to Europe and join the European team that was just forming to grow our business in Europe. So we moved over in the spring of '96, our oldest son was 6 months old. We moved to England where the headquarters was.

Q: What was the next job?

A: So I had a couple jobs in Milwaukee (where Harley-Davidson is based), three different roles. ... I came back and worked on the early Harley-Davidson museum project. ...

I then transitioned into a role on the purchasing side of the company in the motorcycle product development center running what was called development purchasing — working with all suppliers up stream as we were developing new motorcycles, on all the components that we needed them to develop in conjunction with our development in order to bring the motorcycle to market. I was in that role for six months and my boss resigned and I was given the opportunity to run all of the supply chain at Harley as vice president of materials management; that was 2003.

For four-and-a-half years I did that, and then moved to be VP of parts and accessories business; and that was 2007. ... we had decided to buy the sport bike company MV Agusta Group and because of my time in Europe and product development experience and the business integration experience and so forth, I was asked to go run that company in Italy in the summer of 2008. So we moved again as a family to Europe.

I again would have done that role for a long time except 2008 happened with the global economic crisis, and our business all of a sudden was immediately challenged because of that and the board of directors decided to bring in a new CEO following the retirement of the former. ... They made that decision in spring 2009 and asked me to come back and be president of the Harley-Davidson motorcycle company, which includes everything you think of when you think of Harley — bikes, clothing, parts, accessory, global marketing, and engineering product development manufacturing.

That was my new job. I worked in that role for the last six years and to the day I took over as CEO May 1. ... I worked under Keith Wandell who was CEO for six years and we worked on the strategy of the company and to fix the things that needed to be fixed, preserving the thing that needed to be preserved, investing in the things that needed more investment, so it was a wonderful six-year period …

Q: What does it mean to lead such an iconic company?

A: The word that comes to my mind is "stewardship." None of us at the company created this great brand. It is an incredible responsibility to preserve and protect the brand, the value and the power of the brand, and the loyalty and respect and the trust of our customer. So we talk about this all the time and we say we are customer led in everything we do. Everything we do has to make sense and have more value and more power, more impact and more meaning for the guys out here today and the men and women out here riding Harley. There is so much passion and loyalty amongst our customers that it is an incredible responsibility to have and I love it because I love this business, love the people, love the riders, love the dealers and love the employees.

Q: With an increase in female bike owners, what design changes has Harley made to accommodate women (whose legs may not be as long and whose upper body strength may not be as great as men)?

A: It's a great question, and there are literally hundreds of things we have done with the bikes themselves; things like lever effort and the reach it takes to reach the clutch or brake, for example. Change the diameters of the handlebars. We have the FL Low models that have a lower seat and the changes I have mentioned, but they also have an engine that is narrower so that your legs become a tighter triangle when you put your feet on the ground and that bike has a dozen different things done to make it more confident-inspiring for not just short-stature people, but people that may be on the upper end of age spectrum and they have less leg strength. ...

Q: What do the demographics look like now? Who is riding a Harley?

A: We're very proud of our profile. We have a lot of success with our core customers: men age 35 and up, and that is very important to us. I think what we are more proud of is what we have been able to do with what we call our outreach segments. Outreach are women 35 and up, Hispanics 35 and up, African Americans 35 and up, and then the fourth outreach category, which is everybody 18-34. And we have grown with core and we have grown with outreach.