"It's not a big motorcycle, just a groovy little motorbike." - The Beach Boys "Little Honda', 1964
"It's not a big motorcycle/Just a groovy little motorbike/It's more fun that a barrel of monkeys/That two wheel bike/We'll ride on out of the town/To any place I know you like"
Nearly a half-century later, Honda has reinvented the groovy little motorbike for a new generation of young riders. And it can't make them fast enough to satisfy a swarm of buyers.
Dealers are sold out of the tiny Grom -- a name derived from "grommet," for newbie surfer -- and report waiting lists of up to 40 buyers. Many are offering more than the asking price for the street-legal mini-motorcycle, which starts at $2,999, less than many scooters.
At Honda of North Hollywood, sales manager Larry Ingraham said he has 10 people on a waiting list, 30 units on order, and not a single Grom in his showroom.
The Grom sits and rides like a pit bike or a minibike -- like the Honda CT90, Trail 90 or MiniTrail, models that Honda sold by the tens of thousands in the 1970's.
But it has the look of a shrunken street bike and comes equipped with disc brakes and a four-speed manual transmission. Power comes from a 125cc motor. For a street-legal machine, it's a spare nubbin of a thing that, fully fueled, weighs only 225 pounds. At that weight, there's enough power to zip through city traffic but not enough to keep up with "big" motorcycles, like the ones the Beach Boys were singing about in "Little Honda."
"It climbs the hills like a Matchless/Cause my Honda's built really light"
The Grom is easy to ride, easy to park and, at a projected 100 miles per gallon, cheap to operate. The base price is about half what the company gets for its bigger 300cc Forza scooter, and just $400 more than the cost of the company's stripped-down 50cc Ruckus.
For the Grom, the company is taking particular aim at the younger rider. One piece of Grom promotional material reads, "With your own wheels, you can bag the bus and forget about having to beg for rides from your friends or -- shudder -- your Mom." An accompanying photo shows a kid holding a skateboard.
Today in motorcycle history proudly supports the National Association for Bikers with a Disability (NABD). www.nabd.org.uk
