Women ride bikes, too!

[Sump]

Just curious.

Does it annoy any of you other ladies that about the only women featured in motorcycle ads, or ads for gear, are skimpily clad creatures draped over the bike or passively hanging on to the back of a rider (him)?

I keep seeing claims that women are taking to riding in increasing numbers, and that we are the fastest growing demographic for bikes. Yet, the advertisers clearly haven't read the memo. Women who are portrayed as riders and owners of bikes are few and far between. How many of you are enticed to a bike by a pair of anorexic models draped over a machine at a bike show?

I recently saw a YouTube video of what was claimed to be a really funny Monster ad. (I've lost the link, sorry.) It involves a male rider pulling up at a cafe on a monster. A male rider is already there on his scooter. A pretty woman comes out--clearly intending to hop on the back of the scooter. She sees the monster, and gets on the back of that, and they ride off together. Now, to my mind, the ad would be really funny if both men wait dismounted and the woman strolls past them both, hops on the monster, and rides it off.  [moto]

[DesmoDiva]

Yup, it is annoying. 

More of a problem I feel is the fact that alot of women's gear isn't very protective. 

Or it doesn't fit a real woman, a figure that acutally has breasts and hips.   

[duqette]

Yup yup yup, it's true. We are the un-noticed tiny minority of motorcycle riders. I know that Harley-Davidson has done some marketing to females, but the sport bike manufacturers haven't seemed to notice us yet.  I think it's just a numbers game. If you are running the marketing campaign for motorcycle "X", you are most likely going to aim that campaign at your largest constituency.  Even though our numbers are increasing, we are still an almost imperceptible sliver of the motorcycling community. For an example, just look at the number of women in our "roll call" thread, and compare that to the total Members number in the upper right corner of your screen. And Ducati is a brand very popular with us ladies!

I remember when I first started riding I was annoyed by the lack of girl-centric advertising and gear and stuff, but I've come to realize that the actual people in the riding community (especially here in the Bay Area) are very supportive of lady (and not so lady-like  ) riders. So, I ignore the scantily clad fantasy girls (boys will be boys, after all) and enjoy the very real and wonderful riding community I'm a part of ... where the odds are something like ten boys to every girl. Hello!         

[Stella]

This topic really pushes my buttons.  And just today, a mere 45 minutes ago, I had to ask a woman
rider / model if she was ok with us doing a photo shoot with her on the back of a bike – riding cupcake
with her husband/model (as directed by the motorcycle oem who we're doing an ad campaign for).         


She kindly agreed to doing this shot.

I am EXTEREMLY grateful that we have this work but when it came to this particular photo request I had
to bite my tongue.   The OEM's and gear suppliers, with the exception of a few, DO NOT cater to us and/or
do not know how.  It frustrates the majority of us all no doubt!  We're fortunate that as an agency, we are
all riders and most of us are women so the moto oem's are taking notes and talking to us (who better than
us to market to their buyers/our peers?!)   

On a lighter note, I posted a while back about a few product ideas we had for women who ride cupcake.     
Such as the "Moto-Periscope."  Because doesn't every ad show the woman on the back trying to look over
the shoulder of the driver, wrenching her neck along the way?   (How can her neck not hurt at the end of
the day?!  Solution:  Moto-periscope!)     

uhhh.... I could go on but I have to get back to that project!

[somegirl]

I remember when I first started riding I was annoyed by the lack of girl-centric advertising and gear and stuff, but I've come to realize that the actual people in the riding community (especially here in the Bay Area) are very supportive of lady (and not so lady-like  ) riders. So, I ignore the scantily clad fantasy girls (boys will be boys, after all) and enjoy the very real and wonderful riding community I'm a part of ... where the odds are something like ten boys to every girl. Hello!        

+1

On a lighter note, I posted a while back about a few product ideas we had for women who ride cupcake.     
Such as the "Moto-Periscope."  Because doesn't every ad show the woman on the back trying to look over
the shoulder of the driver, wrenching her neck along the way?   (How can her neck not hurt at the end of
the day?!  Solution:  Moto-periscope!)     

    alternative solution: male cupcake

[jdubbs32584]

  alternative solution: male cupcake

An item off my list of To Do's in life:

- Get a pic of Mother riding cupcake behind me. (If we ship my bike to DiMBY, it could happen)

 

[Mother]

not in your sickest dreams

I have a responsibility to mankind

to be...well, manly


unless I get to be pretty pretty princess and wear a tiara and have little cupid wings on my pink ruffled dress

then i will think about it

[somegirl]

    I still regret not getting a picture of Dave on the back of mine.

[Stella]

unless I get to be pretty pretty princess and wear a tiara and have little cupid wings on my pink ruffled dress
then i will think about it

Ouray '09:  Mother cupid riding cupcake.   

you must.   please?

[jdubbs32584]

Ouray '09:  Mother cupid riding cupcake.   

you must.   please?

Oh, hell yeah. 

[Sump]

Yup yup yup, it's true. We are the un-noticed tiny minority of motorcycle riders. I know that Harley-Davidson has done some marketing to females, but the sport bike manufacturers haven't seemed to notice us yet.  I think it's just a numbers game. If you are running the marketing campaign for motorcycle "X", you are most likely going to aim that campaign at your largest constituency.  Even though our numbers are increasing, we are still an almost imperceptible sliver of the motorcycling community. For an example, just look at the number of women in our "roll call" thread, and compare that to the total Members number in the upper right corner of your screen. And Ducati is a brand very popular with us ladies!

Granted. Men are the low-hanging fruit (so to speak). Although I was fascinated to see a report (I've lost the link, alas) from Kawasaki that a third of purchasers of its new 250 are female. Sure, that doesn't translate to many across the board motorcyclists, but even if the proportion is broad-brush indicative of a trend, it's one the manufacturers and advertisers ought to be waking up to.

I wonder, too, if there's not a bit of a Catch-22 operating here. If manufacturers ignore women as potential riders, they don't take our generally smaller sizes--and physical strength--into account when designing bikes. Nor do gear makers pay as much attention to a woman's body shape and needs as they do to men's. So, women who toy with the idea of riding may find fewer bikes to comfortably accommodate them, which hardly encourages them. Similarly, for advertising: if it's all aimed at what the boys want--complete with testosterone-inducing hype and scantily clad models--then that may give women the impression that biking is an all-boys club and not for them. It seems that Ducati, at least, are awake to us. I read and article--I think it was an interview with one of the designers/engineers--who explicitly mentioned the idea of attracting women riders when they came to overhauling the ergonomics of the riding position on the new Monsters. Three cheers for Ducati, right? (Now they just have to give their promo people a bit of a bolt up the backside about showing women riding their Monsters.)

[Max LeanAngle]

                                         

                                                                         Poster Child, er Woman

[red baron]

                                         

                                                                         Poster Child, er Woman

Wow, nice eye focus, what a cool shot.

[Max LeanAngle]

Thanks, Trouble.

That photo was taken by a road side photographer while climbing Palomar Mountain Road in SoCal. [moto]

[Ducgirl]

Just curious.

Does it annoy any of you other ladies that about the only women featured in motorcycle ads, or ads for gear, are skimpily clad creatures draped over the bike or passively hanging on to the back of a rider (him)?

I keep seeing claims that women are taking to riding in increasing numbers, and that we are the fastest growing demographic for bikes. Yet, the advertisers clearly haven't read the memo. Women who are portrayed as riders and owners of bikes are few and far between. How many of you are enticed to a bike by a pair of anorexic models draped over a machine at a bike show?

I recently saw a YouTube video of what was claimed to be a really funny Monster ad. (I've lost the link, sorry.) It involves a male rider pulling up at a cafe on a monster. A male rider is already there on his scooter. A pretty woman comes out--clearly intending to hop on the back of the scooter. She sees the monster, and gets on the back of that, and they ride off together. Now, to my mind, the ad would be really funny if both men wait dismounted and the woman strolls past them both, hops on the monster, and rides it off.  [moto]

Yes, it bugs me. I wrote a letter to the editor of one of the magazines and he wrote back and essentially said "get a life". I was really shocked at that reply, shows you where the guys brains are. Cordially, Ducgirl.