Norton trouble

MxMartin said:
Who is BDO? (sorry, not been paying attention) Who is ZFD, seems knowledgeable but no idea who you are or who you represent?
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BDO. Bikes Down & Out.
BDO. Bring Da Oil.
BDO. Behavioral Detection Officer.
BDO. Big Day Out (of business)

Seriously though I think BDO means business development officer.
 
MxMartin said:
Good to know, I haven't had an original Commando since the mid-80's so I'm a bit out of touch. Wife works for Mortons Media and she is in regular contact with the guys at Norvil but don't think Andover are on the books.
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Mortons don't seem very much in contact with the real Norton world. But then I admit I have instigated a policy of "no more print advertizing", so the print media people aren't fond of us and tend to turn elsewhere and hail others, understandably from their point of view.
I tested the policy in my German shop a while ago, found no dip in sales, hence then told our boys in Andover to let all advertizing in print media run out.

Add to it the half-informed rubbish I read in the various magazines about Norton doesn't entice me to financially support the fairy tales. But then journalists tend to faithfully repeat what their advertizers tell them.
 
Just a wild theory but SG could come back and head up the company again with a pre-pack deal with an Asian investor. If that was to happen though, if the pensioners were sorted and bike deposits paid ack, the new venture would suffer from an awful lot of ill feeling for some time. SG and SS were seen just a couple of days ago at the office.
 
Al's#5 said:
Ref. CCM, I bought one of their Spitfires, took a while to get it but worth the wait, great bunch of lads. If SG had followed their business model we might all be happier bunnies.
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The spitfire uses an “off the shelf” motor, how many criticisms of Norton would there have been if they did that? They got enough stiCk using the Aprilia motor for racing while building and developing their own.
I cannot imagine how much money Honda, Yamaha Suzuki would have spent on developing a new model.
Very sad times for Norton, I have a mk2a Commando, very nearly bought a 961 two years ago. Loved the idea of the 650’s. Was there ever the money for the development etc whoever ran the business?
 
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peter12 said:
The spitfire uses an “off the shelf” motor, how many criticisms of Norton would there have been if they did that? They got enough stiCk using the Aprilia motor for racing while building and developing their own.
I cannot imagine how much money Honda, Yamaha Suzuki would have spent on developing a new model.
Very sad times for Norton, I have a mk2a Commando, very nearly bought a 961 two years ago. Loved the idea of the 650’s. Was there ever the money for the development etc whoever ran the business?
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Taking KD,s engine, tweaking it a little and calling it the 961 seems a similar path originally. V4 etc. although excellent ideas a little ambitious me thinks but still, the 961 I have seems a cracker so not all bad.
 
Welshrugby said:
Just a wild theory but SG could come back and head up the company again with a pre-pack deal with an Asian investor. If that was to happen though, if the pensioners were sorted and bike deposits paid ack, the new venture would suffer from an awful lot of ill feeling for some time. SG and SS were seen just a couple of days ago at the office.
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So he's not been before the Stock Exchange/ Companies House Tribunal yet, there is a very good reason SG will be banned from holding a directorship in any company in the future, so wishful thinking!
 
You can't divorce SG's mess from the old Norton, well not yet anyway, its history and heritage is what SG played on and wasted. Hopefully it can be blanked out at some point but we are where we are and Metro are about to find out how debased it is. Sticking Norton on to prams gave an inkling of the destruction to the brand he was capable of.

Norton trouble
 
0n another note, Ken Bates brought Chelsea football club for £1, then sold it to Roman Abramovich for xxxmillions. Maybe given time they will sell the Norton for the same amount, but it comes with £3 million debt.
 
£3 million? And the rest, government loan, Metro Bank figures combined are over 10 million. There were also others who had money in in it as well.
 
More like £30M but only the administrators will know after their investigations.

Bank loans

3 pension schemes

Govt grants & loans

Tax unpaid including VAT (normaly paid 3 months in arrears)

Customer deposits both partial and full

Unpaid supplier invoices

Did they keep the payroll up to date ?

Etc etc
 
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To be fair though, £30m is pocket change to some folks. I know i’ve worked in businesses where £30m disappears very easily with little to show.

We won’t know what the number is, but if we assume it’s that I could see some players come up, even for the fun of it.
 
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