As popular as Harley Davidson cycles are today, it's true that the company was once on the brink of bankruptcy. After the company was bought by American Machine and Foundry (AMF) in 1951, cutbacks in labor and engineering created machines that were sub-par to many of the Japanese competitors. They were labeled as 'Hogs' and were no longer used by many of the traditional leisure biker. For many years the company fought off bankruptcy and worked to try and regain some of the status that the brand had previously enjoyed.
However, it was not until 1981 when AMF sold the Harley Davidson company back to a group of investors that was led by Willie G. Davidson, a descendant of one of the founders, that things started to turn around for the motorcycle giant. One of the first things they did was to lobby for an imposed tariff on motorcycles that were imported from Japan which were over the 700cc engine size and were therefore in direct competition with Harley Davidson. This succeeded in slowing down the sales from their rivals and allowed them time to start rebuilding and restructuring the company.
Focusing on the 'retro' look of the big motorcycles, and by embracing the Hog name, while at the same time working to improve quality and control standards helped Harley to regain some of the ground that it had lost. As the motorcycles were consistently proven to be high quality, the company saw that sales started to rise. Then, by merchandising their product on T-shirts, riding gear, motorcycle patches, etc, they continued to get the name out there. However, sales really began to take off when they combined forces with Ford in 2000, launching the Harley Davidson F-series trucks.
