ROYAL ENFIELD IS THE SMALLEST OF the four indigenous Indian motorcycle manufacturers in numbers of bikes (no scooters!), behind Hero, Bajaj and TVS in that order. But it’s the only one to market larger-capacity four-stroke models, 350cc and up, so has a much higher-than-average sticker price for each bike delivered to its customers. A total of 88% of these are in India; any Royal Enfield is very much a status symbol in a country where 67% of the 1.43 billion inhabitants (which has now officially overtaken China as the world’s largest) rides a powered two-wheeler, of whatever vintage. No wonder annual pre-Covid sales of all powered two-wheelers peaked there in 2019 at 22 million units!
Indeed, besides India and China, the annual production numbers for the three Royal Enfield plants located in Tamil Nadu
