New Financing Option for Piaggio/Vespa Scooters

From Piaggio USA:

VESPA AND PIAGGIO PARTNER WITH FREEDOMROAD FINANCIAL TO OFFER RETAIL FINANCING
New partnership offers zero down payment, low rates and up to 60 month terms on all new Piaggio and Vespa motor scooters.

November 23, 2010—Piaggio Group Americas and FreedomRoad Financial are pleased to announce an official partnership that will provide retail financing for Piaggio and Vespa scooters in the United States.

“We are looking forward to partnering with a well respected company like FreedomRoad Financial to offer our customers great finance rates so they can more easily afford the Vespa or Piaggio scooter they have been wanting” said Rick Panettieri, Piaggio Group Americas director of product management. “We have been working with Freedom Road Financial for many months now and are expanding the number of brands and models that can be financed with them. We have been pleased with our relationship so far with Moto Guzzi and are looking forward to expanding that to cover the Vespa and Piaggio brands. The longer term loans will provide our customers with good credit the opportunity to have even lower monthly payments.”

FreedomRoad Financial is focused on providing powersports financing nationwide through its network and is known for its commonsense approach to retail lending and high personal service.

“Vespa and Piaggio are iconic brands with economical environmentally friendly products, passionate customers and dealers, and we are thrilled that they have chosen us as their retail financing partner,” stated Tom Collins, Executive Vice President and Managing Director of FreedomRoad Financial, “We look forward to establishing solid relationships with their dealers and being a contributor in helping them grow their sales in this country.”

For more information about Piaggio please visit www.PiaggioUSA.com and for more information about Vespa please visit www.VespaUSA.com.

About The Piaggio Group:
Established in 1884 by Rinaldo Piaggio and based in Pontedera in Pisa, Italy, the Piaggio Group is one of the world’s top manufacturers of two-wheel motor vehicles. With more than 7,000 employees, an annual production of more than 610,000 vehicles in 2009, five R&D centers, seven production facilities in Europe and Asia and operations in more than 50 countries – the Piaggio Group has a consolidated leadership in the European two-wheeler market. The company produces scooters, motorcycles and mopeds in the 50cc to 1,200cc displacement range, marketed under the Piaggio, Vespa, Gilera, Derbi, Aprilia, Scarabeo and Moto Guzzi brands. The Group also manufactures three- and four-wheel light transportation vehicles for the Ape, Porter and Quargo ranges.

Motorsport Scooter Moving Sale

Wonder what kind of deals will be had at this sale?

Join us on Saturday December 11th, as we celebrate a move to our new location by having a monumental rummage sale. This one's so big, we've called it our “Estate Sale.”

Compared to our last garage-sale, this one's going to be filled up with even more badassery, including continental breakfast, great sales, free stuff, and even some haggling! We may even get the coffee maker ready for double-drip-duty to get you guys pumped.

On sale we'll have all kinds of hard-to-find and rare goodies, pretty much whatever the mice have been squirrelling away like ferrets under the warehouse shelves over the last decade! There could be all sorts of awesome stuff in there: beer, fingernails, windshields, even random and rare hardware and rubber bits! Who knows?!

We'll know soon enough and so will you when you see it for sale at our EXTREME ESTATE SALE. Come wake us up on: we'll be sleeping on the asphalt at the shop on December 11th, waiting for our friends to arrive and begin estate sale-ing!

Vespa Motorsport is located at 4225 30th St., San Diego,CA 92104-1234

Scoot! Magazine Annual Board Meeting

Chatting scooters, business, and more scooters.
Left to right, April, Josh, and Paul.



-- Post from my iPhone, out-n-about...

Paul Frank Kids & Small Paul on Sale

I don't have any kids, but I do have a serious scooter collectible problem, and Paul Frank Industries is often after my heart with their scooter-bearing merchandise. Just got word that the Paul Frank Kids and Small Paul lines are on sale, and select items can be had for 30% off. Offer goes from 11/11-11/18 and you must use PAUL30 at checkout. Snap up this cool biker onesie (reg. $28) for your little mod:

Holiday Gift: Knit Scooter Gal

Ladies and gentlemen, start your needles! 

If you have a gift for knitting, have some time, and want to give a handmade gift to a scooterist on your list, consider this knitting pattern for a girl and her scooter. I don't knit, and I can't vouch for how easy/hard this may be, but the finished result looks pretty cute!

Pattern available from etsy for $4.50. You can also check out other views of the project.

Testing & Photographing the new Honda PCX

Moving PCX around for a photoshoot. 

We usually just barge in somewhere unannounced, so I have to keep my gear on in case security shows up to give us the heave-ho. About 10 minutes after this pic was taken, security did show up, so we went onto the next location.  :)

Blog entry soundtrack:

Holiday Gift: Department 56 Village Scooters

Every time I go by the Department 56 displays in stores I wonder why they don't have scooters. Well, it seems that they introduced scooters in 2008, but I never saw them, or my local stockists just didn't order them. Too bad for them-- they could have taken me for some serious money.

The Village Scooters are still available from Department 56 retailers. Two scooters for $20. If you have one in your ton, ask them to order them for you. or you can go to the website and be directed to online retailers that sell them.

 

One of the online retailers is Bronners who also sells this modern scooter ornament (but calls it a moped in the description, dernit). 

New Armadillo Scooter Wear

The UK's Armadillo Wear is launching two new jackets for Fall: the Women's Betsy and Men's Alex jackets can be seen in this sneak-peek video. The jackets will be launched at the SEMA show this week, with more info to come.

Need UM Parts? MRP Can Help

This week, MRP announced that it acquired the assets of United Motors, which distributed Hyosung scooters in the USA. UM closed earlier this year and many owners (and dealers) had a tough time locating parts. While MRP does not sell directly to consumers, dealers can get OEM and accessories from MRP, which also carries parts for Malaguti, TNG – CMSI Scooters, Diamo – LS Motorsports, Italjet America, CPI Scooters and ATVs.

If you have a scooter which is under any of these marques, you can find an MRP dealer through the company's website, or direct your local repair shop to get parts directly from MRP.

Holiday Gift: Hello Lucky Letterpress Cards

I guess it's time to start the scooterist holiday gift guide. Some say that Nov. 2 is too early, but many of my picks may need to be ordered for delivery, so it's never to early to start! Today's suggested gift are stationery items from Hello Lucky! The company is run by two sisters who are based in San Francisco. While they previously had some other items with scooters on them, they currently sell:

• Birthday Vespa Card $4.50
• Vespa Girl Holiday Card (individual or set of 6) $4.50-$15
• Vespa Girl Wrapping Paper $5.75

While the cards can be useful for friends, I think the wrapping paper is the most useful. Order now for the holidays!

Super-Cool Gift: Scoot! Track Jacket

With the gift-giving season coming up quick, let me suggest a cool gift for the fashionable scooterist: The Scoot! Track Jacket. These aren't some stock jackets that we just had our logo embroidered on, We had these made specifically for us, and for you!  A handful of U.S. scooter shops carry these, but we have the full range of sizes: unisex S-2XL.  A super-steal for just $40.

Order one, now!