“Owners of Asheville's 12 Bones plan BMW motorcycle dealership” |
| Owners of Asheville's 12 Bones plan BMW motorcycle dealership Posted: 24 Dec 2010 09:42 PM PST ASHEVILLE — From the president's favorite barbecue to BMW motorcycles, Tom Montgomery and Sabra Kelley will have it all covered next year. The couple opened their first fantastically successful 12 Bones restaurant in the River Arts District in 2005 and followed with another thriving location in Arden in 2008. They now plan to establish a BMW motorcycle dealership next spring. Plans call for opening the full-service operation in Biltmore Village in late April or early May. It also will sell Husqvarna dirt bikes and Vespa scooters. "I basically felt there was a serious need for one," said Montgomery, a motorcycle rider and enthusiast. "There's a serious gap around here, as far as BMW motorcycle service. When I was searching for a bike, BMW was at the top of my list, but I didn't want to drive to Greenville (S.C.), for any kind of service I needed." In their research, Montgomery and Kelley found that the Asheville area has 800 registered BMW motorcycles in about a 30-mile radius. Besides Greenville, the next closest dealerships are in Charlotte and Greensboro in North Carolina, and Knoxville and Chattanooga in Tennessee. "It's been an underserved market for us for some time," said Gary Busch, manager of dealer development (east), for BMW Motorrad USA. "We think the potential for the market is pretty good, because Asheville is a pretty affluent area and it's such a great crossroads for motorcycle riding." The dealership will likely employ eight-10 people, Montgomery said, and he'll bounce back and forth between the Sweeten Creek 12 Bones restaurant he usually manages and the motorcycle operation. Kelley, who initially will help with some of the bookkeeping at BMW, will continue operating the Riverside Drive restaurant. The restaurants have gotten a huge boost from President Barack Obama, who's dined at the Riverside Drive location twice. The president and first lady Michelle Obama made a beeline for 12 Bones when arriving for their Asheville vacation in April. The president also ate there in 2008 while in town to prepare for a presidential debate. The couple knows they'll have their work cut out for them with another business in the mix, but they have no plans to curtail either restaurant operation. "Everyone thinks we're selling our business," Kelley said, mentioning a "for sale" sign the owner of the Riverside Drive building put in the window. "We just signed an updated extension on the lease for the next three years, so we're not going anywhere." This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
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