Coming close on the heels of the death of Syrian President Hafez Assad, Suzuki Motor Corporation's diplomatic public relations arm made a unilateral announcement that it "ceases relations with Motocross Action Magazine". The announcement follows the publication of MXA's 2000 Suzuki DRZ400 test in the July 2000 issue.
An official spokesman for Motocross Action said, "We are surprised by Suzuki's announcement given the fact that we were unaware that we had any relations with them in the first place."
Here is the complete text of Suzuki's announcement.
Press release- June 14, 2000:
"American Suzuki Motor Corporation (ASMC) announced today that it will cease all relations with Motocross Action Magazine, published by Hi-Torque Publication, based on what ASMC feels are unfair journalistic practices.
"According to Mel Harris, Suzuki's Vice President of Sales and Marketing, ASMC has attempted to resolve the problem with Motocross Action with little success.
"Among other things, the role of a motorcycle magazine should be to fairly and objectively evaluate a product and report on its findings. We recognize and welcome that process. However, for too long now, Motocross Action has gone beyond objective product testing and chosen to unfairly attack Suzuki as a company, its marketing direction, its racing team(s) and even its employees. We feel this is beyond the purview of Motocross Action and we object. The decision to cease relations with the magazine is based solely on the notion that we will not support biased journalism," said Harris. American Suzuki Motor Corporation will discontinue providing Motocross Action with product and product information as well as suspend all advertising.
"According to Harris, "It is our hope that Hi-Torque will recognize the problems they are having with Motocross Action and proactively address the issue. If and when Motocross Action begins fair, objective journalism we will reevaluate our decision. Additionally, we have no quarrel with other magazines published by Hi-Torque and will continue to recognize those publications."
LET'S BE SERIOUS FOR A SECOND
MXA's point of view differs greatly from Suzuki's, but both are in agreement that the relationship has been strained for more than a decade. Suzuki's Vice President of Sales and Marketing Mel Harris' comment that Suzuki "has attempted to resolve the problem with Motocross Action with little success" is patently untrue. Suzuki has never contacted MXA about anything. Any contact between Suzuki and MXA has always been initiated by MXA and typically met with minimal response. Harris, who is the father-in-law of a competing magazine's editor, has never spoke to MXA about this issue. In fact, Suzuki did not even send the press release announcing the breaking of diplomatic ties to MXA.
NOT THE FIRST TIME, NOT THE LAST
It should be noted that this is not the first time Suzuki has "ceased relations" with MXA. It's not even the second time. Suzuki has pulled its bikes from MXA several times in the past, once for a two-year period. In Suzuki's defense, it's not unusual for a company to get upset about a bad review of their product and try to take their ball and go home. But, it doesn't work. MXA will continue to test Suzuki's (just as it did the last time it was banned by Suzuki) and, sadly, with the exact same amount of technical support we have received from Suzuki in the past several years--which is none.
Motocross Action does not need Suzuki's support, but it is in their best interest to have ours. By not cooperating with the magazine, Suzuki has done potential RM buyers a disservice. MXA has a reputation as the most honest, objective and unbiased of all magazines. It is the only magazine that doesn't pull punches. Suzuki, which claims that MXA has "unfairly attacked" them probably doesn't remember that MXA picked the RM125 as the Bike of the Year in 1995, 1994 and 1992 (and the 1996 RM250 was the 250cc Bike of the Year). Not to mention the fact that we had Suzuki's on the covers of the June, July and August 2000 issues. As for the future, if Suzuki should build an exceptionally good motorcycle, we will be the first to praise it in our test (just as we did in '92, ‘94, ‘95 and ‘96). We will not compromise our testing standards to make friends with Suzuki or to punish them. Either one would be wrong.
BAD TIME AT BLACK ROCK
This is not the best time for Suzuki to begin a feud, while Yamaha's market share has grown, Suzuki's has shrunk. According to recent industry surveys (from September 1999 through April 2000), Suzuki currently represents 11.7 percent of the competition market, which is less than half of third place, Kawasaki, at 25 percent. Yamaha has 30 percent of the market. Suzuki efforts should be spent on improving relations.
Suzuki's threat to "suspend all advertising" from MXA is almost meaningless since Suzuki has a smaller ad campaign (in terms of dollars and pages) with MXA than Yamaha, Honda, Kawasaki, KTM, TM or VOR. Suspending advertising when you barely advertise is no threat.
WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?
Nothing. Last year, when Suzuki did its press day with MXA for the RM250, none of Suzuki's management showed up. Actually, Suzuki only sent a contract mechanic on his way to another race (and he only stayed for two hours). The mechanic had no jets, no springs, no sprockets and minimal knowledge of the new bike.
MXA is not angry at Suzuki. At the least, we are mildly amused. Amused that they want people to believe that they made any sort of attempt to resolve their disagreements over bike tests, amazed that they think that our saying that "Damon Huffman lacks desire" or "that they need to hire better test riders" are unfair attacks on a Suzuki employee, offended that they think a true-to-life assessment of the performance of their machine is biased and stunned that they think this will have any effect on our relationship (since we haven't had a relationship of any substance since 1987).
Feuds don't benefit anyone, but this feud hasn't hurt MXA over the last decade. Can Suzuki say the same thing?
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