It's those d*mn unions, I'm tellin' ya. Why should companies pay workers a decent wage?(you know, those workers who put in 8 hours a day assembling those various parts sorted from around the world) If those workers wanted a decent wage, they should have stayed in school and learned how to screw...er...utilize their intellect in order to "get ahead"!(like sending their fellow countrymen's jobs offshore)
You see...that's all it is! Why do you think Harley-Davidson assembles all their bikes in Swaziland now? It's because the american buying public just will not put up with having to pay a premium for their product anymore!!!
(the preceeding was offered of course tongue-in-cheek, as I guess that there just might be an upside to all this Harley-Davidson "mystique"-talk, and for people actually willing to pay that premium for all that American-built "mystique".
So Bobu, I think it's about time to face the fact that there really aren't any national borders anymore in most cases. The whole idea that some sort of nationalistic pride of craftmanship is, and has been, an anchronism for some time now, though I have to admit that I find your offer to pay a little more for a "british-built" Triumph somewhat quaint and actually somewhat noble. The realities today are that if you want to support a "tradition", you sir will be highly outnumbered by the rest of the buying public, and you will not be heard by the bean counters(those were the "smart fellows" who stayed in business school and learned how to crunch the numbers, and thus only they deserve the "big bucks", ya know...tongue-in-cheek again, BTW) who know that the overwhelming numbers of the american buying public, unless some sort of perceived notion of "mystique" overrides their monetary-sense(such as paying 3 friggin' bucks for a cup of coffee at Starbucks), will look to pay the least amount they can for their goods.
You sir are an anomaly...and evidently so are all those americans who still buy Harley-Davidson motorcycles...proudly STILL assembled in the good ol' U.S. of A!(by union members making decent wages)
In other words....I'll bet Mr.Bloor has a whole bevy of smart little bean-counters, who using their actuarial charts, know to which degree that you Bobu are that anomaly, and know to what corresponding degree the remaining vast numbers of consumers couldn't care less about buying a Triumph assembled in Thailand.
So though Triumph does have a "heritage" that they could protect and build upon by making their machines only on that little island of their's, their "mystique" isn't strong enough to "make the numbers work".
(but I hear ya, dude)
Cheers,
Dwight
(what was that quote by that big-eared little Texan who made a half-hearted attempt for the presidency a while back....oh yeah...."That great sucking sound coming from the south"....but in this case, south-east Asia)
