Motorcycle clubs (MCs) have been all the rage ever since the motorcycle was first introduced to the world. Case in point, the oldest motorcycle club in the world is the Yonkers Motorcycle Club of New York, which was founded in the year 1903, the same year that Harley-Davidson tried to sell its first models.
Since then, the world has seen the rise and rise of MCs either for leisure and socialization, or for criminal activities. Hells Angels, one of the most popular MCs in the world, immediately comes to mind when you put motorcycle clubs and criminal activities together in one sentence, but fact of the matter is, such MCs are the 1% of the world’s motorcycle riding community.
Malaysia too has a huge number of MCs, how many in total is unknown as there is no governing body that monitors and sanctions the MCs, but 100 clubs is easy if you consider the mopeds and scooter clubs.
One such club is the Heaven MC, a club founded in 2015 and is made up of predominantly Harley-Davidsons but is open to riders of all types of V-Twin powered motorcycles.
The club is headed by Nick Lum (top right), who took over as President in 2016 and is in charge of keeping the club’s 125 members occupied with weekend rides and such.
I had the pleasure of having a few brewskis with Nick last week to talk about the club he actively leads.
“The club only had 20 members when I joined with about 8 to 10 active riders. There was this one time where we organised a weekend ride but only me and this guy named Alex Locke showed up on Sunday morning. I remember us looking at each other and feeling clueless, and from then on Alex and I went out to actively recruit members,” said Nick that night at The Gasket Alley.
With a background in MNC marketing and the regional direct sales industry, Nick together with Alex, set out to to build and recruit members using the law of averages. “I knew that the more people we recruited, the higher the chances were of more people coming out to ride over the weekend. If we spoke to 50 people about Heaven MC and only 20% showed up over the weekend, that would be good enough for us as that is better than just two people showing up. These days we can easily get over 100 riders out for a ride, I would say we have done well,” explained Nick.
The 53 year old Nick is an active rider himself and owns a Harley-Davidson V-Rod Muscle, Road King Classic and a Street Glide CVO, and has gone through a number of Harleys in his riding career. “For me, riding a Harley-Davidson is akin to driving a Bentley or a Rolls-Royce. Not only are the bikes a symbol of status, but I also feel safe riding a Harley as I don’t need to ride fast to get satisfaction. Cars these days are way too expensive, a Harley on the other hand is also expensive for a motorcycle, but a lot more affordable and it changes your life.”
When asked about Heaven MC, the President says it is a fun, non-profit MC. The club’s most notables rides has been the inaugural ride to open the new Harley-Davidson PJ showroom where the club’s members were a part of about 500 Harley owners who rode together to celebrate the new showroom.
The club is open to all bikers who ride any type of V-twin motorcycle. There is no membership fees and everyone is welcome to join the weekend rides. The club actively supports events and community service and actively organizes fund raisers for any charity that needs it.
The club mostly organizes local rides, but also rides to Thailand up to three times a year. The club also recently held its annual CNY gathering to celebrate with their achievement and to share their upcoming plans. Harley-Davidson of Petaling Jaya also took part as a dealer to celebrate the annual event together with HOG of PJ to foster Harley-Davidson brotherhood. Anyone interested to join the club and its rides can get more information at the Heaven MC Facebook page.
Motorcycling lifestyle needs both the dealership and its customer base to support one another. A failure at either end will inadvertently spell the end of the brand’s presence. This is why Heaven MC showed their support to the Harley-Davidson of Petaling Jaya (HDPJ) showcase at 3Damansara Mall.
The riders of Heaven MC first met up at Harley-Davidson of Petaling Jaya in The Gasket Alley for some breakfast before riding a short distance to 3Damansara Mall. There, there were provided a preferred parking space. The presence of the bikes and riders gave shoppers the opportunity to view not just the Harleys but also the lifestyle that comes with the brand.
HDPJ also made it possible for us to speak to Nick Lum, the President of Heaven MC.
“The focus of Heaven MC is to support public events, for example, launches, weddings, and so forth, to provide the ‘boom’ effect to the public.”
“Heaven MC has been around for three-and-half years. We noticed wherever the group goes on Harleys, there is a lot of publicity and people would look at the group. Putting that into marketing perspective, there’s impact.”
“We were invited by HDPJ to bring 25 to 30 bikes to show the impact to the public. We did the last event for Skybar in Traders Hotel three weekends ago during MotoGP. The crowd was really excited when they saw Harleys coming. In short, the Harley brand, the soul, the sound, the looks, the culture attract public (attention), so it works. Conventional events as we know (are with) balloons, clowns, fireworks, firecrackers, dancers… To me those are conventional events.”
“As a club, Heaven MC found that it’s a better reason to ride (rather than) going around to eat every weekend.”
“Charities are good but there are so many other clubs doing it already, so we do it once a year.”
“So far so good (for Heaven MC). We have about 120 registered members. We can get up to 25 riders on average with short notice. Given enough time, we can confidently get 50 to 60 riders to join the ride or event. However if the organizer wants a bigger impact, we can invite our friends in other bike clubs to join forces to bring it to 80 to 100 bikes, easily.”
“The biggest impact for Heaven MC was when Harley-Davidson of Petaling Jaya opened. We joined forces with HOG PJ and managed to put in 500 bikes for the launch event. That was a success. It basically gave us the confidence to hold any other future events.”
“If you need our support during our events, you can look up Heaven MC. We are friendly.”
There you have it. It’s good to have bikers who attend events to lend support to them, while having some fun themselves. But as Nick said, don’t worry, these are friendly bikers.
© Copyright – BikesRepublic.com 2023 Trademarks belong to their respective owners. All rights reserved
