INSIDE
By Stephen Metzger
Managing Director
Small Vehicle Resource, LLC
[email protected]
www.smallvehicleresource.com
THE GATED
COMMUNITY
Who, If Anyone, Is Breaking New
Ground in Small Vehicle Product
Development?
M
any of the well-known 19th
century economists (e.g.,
Adam Smith, David Ricard,
John Stuart Mill) worried about the
possibility that there would be a de-
cline in new investment opportunities.
As new investment was mainspring of
economic improvement (as it is today),
a dearth of such opportunities would
result in diminishing, or even negative
growth in future periods. for the big picture, is unlikely to hold for each and
every individual market. Such may be the case for
small, task-oriented vehicles (STOVs). STOVs are
comprised of a wide variety of small vehicles, in-
cluding golf cars, personal transportation vehicles
(PTVs), light duty utility vehicles, and off-road work
and recreational vehicles. A broad summary of the
markets for these vehicles would indicate:
As history tells us, their worries were
unfounded, because, aside from
business cycles, the economies of
developed nations continued to grow
as new technologies and new prod-
ucts came to the fore. Nonetheless,
some of this thinking has trickled into
the 21st century, and is even promot-
ed by some of the more determined
environmentalists, who see increased
incomes and economic betterment as
curse on Mother Earth. • An off-road segment maturing and well-past its
growth period of the first decade of the 2000s;
While historically clear and one would
guess, with a certain amount of con-
fidence for the future, that new tech-
nologies have driven and will continue
to drive the U.S., as well as the global
economy to new heights, what holds
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WWW.GOLFCAROPTIONS.COM
• Virtually no growth, maybe slow negative growth
for fleet golf cars;
• Reasonable growth prospects (albeit not spectacular)
for PTVs and light-duty utility vehicles.
What, Me Worry?
Hey, why should we in our beloved, easy-going
gated communities worry about industry trends?
After all, we have our 20th century vehicles, which
some persist in calling “golf carts”. Perhaps we
should be content with these antiquated, yet still
useful carriages that get us from point A to point B
(as long as points A and B are within the perimeter
of our community), at speeds less than speedy, and
where innovation and better performance seems
to be restricted to the show-off deck-outs we see
and enjoy at our annual golf cart parades.