GOLD BAR & SHIELD AWARD!

Wow, we did it again! I got a text message at 10:59pm from our District Manager at Harley-Davidson that said "You won, Adventure Harley-Davidson is a Gold Bar and Shield Circle of Excellence recipient." This is our second year in a row winning Gold Bar and Shield. Winning the first time was difficult, winning two years in a row is monumental. You see, Gold Bar and Shield means you are recognized as one of the top 25 Harley Dealerships in the country. Out of almost 700 dealerships, this is a great honor, as many dealerships have never won.

When Franscene and I bought the dealership in 2003, we had many goals. Build a new facility, be the dealership of choice for our customers, employees, and the Harley-Davidson Motor Company. We also wanted win a Gold Bar and Shield award. Bar and Shield is a measurement of your customer satisfaction, employee training, sales performance, facilities, and overall dealership efficiency. You don't win Gold Bar and Shield by yourself. You win it with the hard efforts of a lot of people.

Winning Gold B&S to me is confirmation. Confirmation that our plan to take care of our customers and employees was correct. Confirmation that we have the RIGHT people. Our dealership team from the Managers, technicians and service staff, sales departments, administrative, marketing, and the people in the back you never see, is loaded with GREAT people. We know to be recognized as a Gold B&S dealership that many people had to support the effort and pull in the same direction. We also know that many loyal customers and HOG chapter members who support us and volunteer at our events had to step up to help us win. These people have worked side by side with us as we have worked to make this a great dealership.

We are very proud as a team of this accomplishment! But, we also know this is recognition of last year's performance and that we have set a standard that our customers, fellow associates, and the Motor Company expects from us. We don't take that lightly and we will do everything we can to perform even better this year for our stakeholders; our customers, employees, and the Motor Company.

So if you are reading this we thank you, because you in some way contributed to our success and we recognize and appreciate that!

Mike Davis
Dealer Principal