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The McFarland Group is collaborating with KAYTEE Pet Foods on a public relations effort to promote the ownership of pet birds and small animals during a recession. As an inexpensive alternative to the traditional dog or cat, pet birds and companion animals provide the same comfort and responsibility as their larger counterparts at a fraction of the cost.

Last week the BMW Owners of America Club held it’s national rally at the Washington County Fairgrounds just south of West Bend, Wisconsin. About 8,000 two-wheeled Bimmer fans gathered there to camp, drink beer and enjoy kindred camaraderie with like thinkers for 3 days. I first heard of the rally on Jonathan Green’s afternoon drive-time show on WTMJ on Wednesday and decided that it might be worth the trip for a few hours on Saturday afternoon.

So I jumped on the Honda and headed north hoping that I’d be allowed in with the BMW crowd even though my bike was built on the wrong continent. What I observed after arriving at the fairgrounds was one of the best-orchestrated marketing efforts I have ever seen. I noted from the weekend local media ramblings that our Milwaukee broadcast and print media pretty much ignored this event, no doubt in deference to “King Harley” only 25 miles to the south of this gathering.

As I rode through the “motorcycles only” entrance, I was greeted by the sight of thousands of BMW motorcycles and their owners spread out wall-to-wall as far as I could see all exhibiting a civilized version of brand loyalty that would make any other brand jealous. I saw bike plates from almost every state, Texas, California, Florida, North Carolina, Alaska and a bunch more from every Canadian province. And unlike other rallies in Sturgis or Daytona where trailers do most of the work, these folks rode their bikes all the way to this rally from wherever they live.

After ponying up the 35 bucks to get in and a rather lengthy registration system designed to extract every demographic fact they could get out of me before they’d wrap the required blue band around my left wrist, I headed into the main grounds through the main exhibition hall.

I have never seen so many vendors with more ’stuff’ for motorcycles in my life. You could buy blue-tooth equipped helmets along with every electronic gadget known to man. Global positioning systems, communication devices, mp3s, radar detectors, flashing lights, bike luggage, gloves, jackets, riding suits, boots, tires, you name it, it was there for you if you wanted to burp your credit cards. And buy they did. In most cases the companies selling the accessories had an area set up in back of the hall where they’d help you install the new toys right there. My guess is there were over 100 vendors selling their wares and all of them were doing land-rush business.

After I made my way through the “toy store”, I headed out back where numerous hospitality tents were set up for rally seminars. According to the program they gave me at registration, one could learn how to fix your speedometer, ride in crosswinds, restore a vintage bike, and even learn how to use zen to improve your riding skills. And, all the seminar tents were full of interested audiences!

After taking in the seminar activity, I headed over to the biggest display on the grounds, the BMW factory motorcycle area where multiples of every single new BMW motorcycle model were on display and available to demo if you signed up early enough, and I mean really early. I’m sure BMW wrote a lot of orders for new bikes at this rally. You could see the excited interest in the eyes of the folks perusing the display and there were plenty of BMW salespeople at the ready to help out with the buying decisions.

With 3 1/2 hours of rallying under my belt, I headed north from the event to ride the Kettle Moraine trails to Elkhart Lake where I planned on spending the night before heading home on Sunday morning. Anybody who rides will tell you that these are some of the best motorcycle touring roads in the US. I rode up to Dundee which is now famous for the “Extreme Home Makeover” house which just might change the building codes in that berg forever. Then up along Long Lake where they probably could use a change in the codes from the looks of the mobile homes and cottages that line the western shore.

I hit Highway 67 and headed west toward Plymouth. About 15 miles ahead was a Bimmer couple flagging me down on the opposite side of the road with a Harley couple stopped right behind them. They were from Toronto and were enjoying their tour when they suffered a flat rear tire while heading back to the rally. The guy on the Harley and his wife were lending a hand and the Toronto gal wanted the emergency phone number at the rally to call for a tow.

Luckily their new Bimmer’s tool kit included a tire repair kit and the Harley guy and the Toronto guy got the tire repaired enough to get them back to the rally. Note to self: pick up tire repair kit for the Honda soon.

As I rode away from the two bikes I couldn’t help but think of the difference between the Bimmer couple and the Harley couple. The Bimmer folks were wearing helmets, gloves and protective jackets (and it was pretty hot) while the Harley couple were in jeans and sleeveless tee shirts. It wouldn’t even be a contest to guess who would come out ahead if one of them went down.

But it was great to see that even though they were night and day different in their motorcycle cultures, here they were on the side of the road with the Harley guy helping out the Bimmer guy. I guess no matter what our demographic or brand preference might be, we’re all just bikers out having a good time riding the same roads together.

Weekend afternoons would be spent with a group of like-minded guys getting together to wash, wax, and treat their chariots to unlimited customization from purveyors of Iskey cams, cherry bomb exhaust systems, sheep skin seat covers, Hurst floor shifters, etc.(Anybody remember Miss Hurst?) They eagerly awaited the arrival of car parts catalogs from JC Whitney and others to see what else they could add to further personalize and make their four wheels stand out in a crowd. They knew the make and model of every car on the road and were proud of it.

Today, cars just don’t score very high on the interest meter for the majority of this demo. Oh sure, every kid with an X-Box has at least one driving game. And there’s a small segment of the population mostly from Hispanic or Oriental backgrounds that really know how to “soup up” a car. But the days of really getting wrapped up in the pride of ownership of a car for this age group are pretty much over.

This has a lot to do with the fact that most cars, new and used, are out of reach financially for the 16-20 somethings (if I can’t afford a car, why bother with the license?) and the technology built into them doesn’t give a guy much of a chance to tinker other than to jack it up, pull the drain plug and change the oil (and what fun is that?).

Back this up with the fact that there are now so many marquees, models and brands, that it’s hard to tell one from another. And all this should be a big red warning signal to the car makers from every side of the globe because as this demographic ages, these “non-car guys” will have a lot to do with whether many of them survive or fail.

If you’re one of us, you know what I mean. Seems like in every issue there’s a story on how bad the economy is going, and another story (in the same issue mind you) on how good the economy is doing. Often on facing pages! Well, I guess we have to give these reporters credit for playing both sides of the fence, because no matter how good or bad the economy’s doing, they’re always going to be right.

I had the honor of giving an interview to a reporter named Daniel Kurt with the Waukesha Freeman business page a few weeks ago. He called about four times until he found me and then spent about 20 minutes grilling me on my thoughts of where the economy was headed. He was particularly interested in how the construction business was doing, probably because we do a lot of work for clients in the construction equipment business.

So I told him that I really didn’t think the construction industry was in as dire straits as has been reported. Sure the housing market sucks, but that’s been coming for a long time and is more self-inflicted by stupid lenders than anything else. I also told him that there’s more to the construction market than housing. Think commercial, highway and international. What do you suppose is going on with all those cranes dotting the skylines of seemingly every major city in the world?

After the interview, Kurt told me to expect to see my quotes included in part 2 of his story the following Tuesday. So, being the egomaniac that I am, I anted up a half a buck and bought a copy of the following Tuesday’s Freeman. And to my surprise, no quotes from our interview were included. But there were plenty from others who seemed to think the economy was headed into a deep, dark recession.

I evidently hadn’t given him the answers he was looking for because he had the assignment to write the “bad” side of the story that week. Oh well, it will be a long time before I pick up that rag again anyway.

These events reminded me about a discussion I had a lot of years ago with an old sage in the ag business, Lamont Webster. I was talking about how bad the existing drought was affecting the ag equipment business. Lamont’s take was “Mike, this is a big country. Every year there are going to be places that have drought, and some that have too much rain, and some that get just the right amount of moisture for their crops. It’s never the same everywhere”.

There’s something to be learned from this. In our worldwide economy, there is always going to be areas that have it good, some that have it bad, and some that have it just ok. Hmmm. Maybe these reporters are right after all.