Peter Stevens acquisition marks new chapter for Motorcycle Holdings

Two-wheel retail giant Motorcycle Holdings (MCH) will use its acquisition of eight Peter Stevens and Harley Heaven stores as a launching pad to become an undisputed industry leader.

The ASX-listed company is already a major player in Australia and New Zealand through an extensive retail and wholesale network, but the addition of eight new sites gives it better geographical reach and potentially stronger online capabilities.

In a one-on-one conversation with bikesales, MCH CEO Matthew Wiesner said the company “left the ego at the door” to find better ideas, people, and systems that complement its existing businesses.

“There are a lot of other things that are going to come off the back of this acquisition that allow us to do more because we’ve put ourselves in markets we didn’t exist in,” Wiesner said. “In many cases, there are a lot of things they do better than this group.”

According to Wiesner, the acquisition was opportunistic rather than premeditated, though MCH was aware of Peter Stevens’ financial struggles.

“Certainly, there had been some noise around the place, but we weren’t preparing anything at the time. If anything, we were looking internally,” he said. “The plan was always to grow, but not necessarily the next day.”

However, when Korda Mentha was appointed administrator of Peter Stevens and put the company up for sale, MCH seized the opportunity.

“If you’re not growing, you’re dead,” Wiesner explained. “There’s a bit of equity in the Peter Stevens and Harley Heaven brands, and none of that was lost when we went after those assets. We obviously picked the bits we wanted, because there are businesses that we’ve picked up that are very good businesses with some very good people.”

Currently, MCH is treating Peter Stevens and Harley Heaven as a separate division from its existing retail brands, including TeamMoto and Morgan and Wacker.

“We wanted to keep Peter Stevens and Harley Heaven together, people-wise, and maintain their processes,” Wiesner said. “And to have a little internal competition is never a bad thing.”

For Wiesner, who became CEO at the end of 2024, a key focus is improving e-commerce and digital data capabilities, while creating a true omni-channel approach across all its retail businesses, integrating both online and bricks-and-mortar stores.

“Obviously, the digital data piece is vital,” he explained. “We’ve got to get much better at delivering on those experiences and using data to make decisions, whether that’s inventory, targeting customers, building our e-commerce capabilities, and so on.”

In support of these goals, the company recently appointed Denise Tung as Executive General Manager of Technology, Digital and Data.

“Denise will be coming in with a brief to reorganize our world to become a digital and data-led organization, which we are a long way from today,” Wiesner said.

The acquisition of Peter Stevens and Harley Heaven stores also allows MCH to reorganize its Motorcycle Accessories Superstore (MCAS) brand and return it to a dedicated parts and accessories retail business.

“MCAS was originally dedicated to being the clearance retail channel for our Cassons parts and accessories distribution business,” Wiesner explained.

“Over the years, that model changed, and previous management merged it with motorbikes, turning it into a hybrid dealership, parts and accessories channel. My view was that it kind of lost its way, and we’re transitioning it back into the Cassons fold so it can drive the parts and accessories business from a retail perspective in an omni-channel way.”

Wiesner also hopes to expand the MCAS brand nationally now it has a bigger presence in Perth and Adelaide through Peter Stevens.

"We see an opportunity to build that out better into a really strong e-comm and bricks-and-mortar omni-channel brand, and really help Cassons drive their products through other dealers and retailers.

"So that's going to be important to get it back to where it was, but with some better tech and a better customer experience from an online point of view."