56 Business The EconomistNovember 14th 2020
2 many,albeitat significantly higher cost
thanks to the additional safety measures. It
continued to make all of its 120 varieties.
Maintaining supplies to Germany, one
of Barilla’s most important markets, even
required dedicated transport. Starting in
March the job of providing 22% of the pasta
and as much as 39% of the sauces eaten in
Germany meant dispatching two trains a
week from Parma to Ulm, its main ware-
house in the country. Each train has 16 wag-
ons transporting 490 tonnes of pasta, 60
tonnes of sauces and 50 tonnes of pesto.
From June the trains ran three times a
week; soon they might make four journeys.
The question for Barilla and other pas-
ta-makers is whether the boom will outlast
the pandemic. Luigi Cristiano Laurenza of
the International Pasta Organisation is
confident. Pasta consumption worldwide
increased from 7m tonnes in 1999 to 16m
tonnes last year, even before it became a
pandemic staple. Italy may have lost its ap-
petite a little in recent years but there is
room for growth nearly everywhere else, in
particular in Africa and Asia. Pasta is cheap,
tasty and versatile, says Mr Laurenza, mak-
ing it especially attractive for cash-
strapped families battered by a pandemic.
It is especially important for Barilla that
plates remain laden after a series of mis-
steps. In 2002 it spent €1.8bn on a hostile
takeover of Kamps, a German baker. It
turned out to be a costly mistake and in
2010 Barilla sold Kamps to a private-equity
firm. In September 2013, Guido Barilla, the
company’s chairman, said that the firm’s
family values meant that he would not do a
“commercial with a homosexual family”.
The comments provoked an outcry, in par-
ticular in America, and threats of a boycott.
Mr Barilla was forced to apologise and the
firm subsequently launched a limited-edi-
tion pasta box showing two women shar-
ing a kiss over spaghetti. Although cooking
pasta requires plenty of hot water, pasta-
makers should stay out of it. 7Profit sauceD
espitetheautumnchill,a grouphas
gathered in front of the Iron Horse
Royal Enfield dealership, a small stone
building set in the Connecticut hills. A
woman sits on a motorcycle, its single-
cylinder engine thumping with a dis-
tinctive sound. In the window a striking
chrome-and-black model looks much
like what would have rolled out of En-
field’s original factory in Redditch in the
British Midlands in the company’s hey-
day in the 1950s.
Enfield, dating back to 1901, boasts of
the longest lifespan of any motorcycle
manufacturer. But Iron Horse only began
selling its bikes in 2018 and the name
remains relatively unknown in America
and other markets outside India. The
company’s original British operations
closed in 1970; the surviving Indian
remnant was heading the same way
before a stunning revival that saw annual
sales grow from 31,000 units in 2006 to
more than 800,000 in 2019, transforming
the value of Enfield’s parent company,
Eicher Motors, a tractor-maker, from just
a few hundred million dollars to $8.5bn.
Now the company is accelerating into the
wider world.
Enfields are a throwback, devoid of
modern frills and with the looks of a
classic bike. Engines ranging from 350cc
to 650cc are large for India but small
compared with machines from firms
such as of Triumph and bmw. Enfield
declined to enter the largest part of the
Indian market, which is for small and
cheap bikes, and will not attempt to
make the expensive, tech-laden ma-chinesthatbikersgenerallyhankerafter
in rich countries. Improvements have
tackled mechanical shortcomings with-
out undermining the existing sound, feel
and look. They must, says Siddhartha Lal,
Eicher’s boss, provide “everything you
need and nothing you don’t”.
A consequence of this approach is
that production is confined to a limited
number of straightforward motorcycles
produced at high volume which en-
hances economies of scale and enables
profitability at low prices. The most
expensive Enfield in America is $6,400,
making the bikes accessible to a wider
potential market. Machines from Harley-
Davidson, which has suffered falling
sales in recent years, often cost more
than three times as much.
Enfield is aiming to sell 20% of its
production abroad. Over the past five
years, it has added 700 dealers world-
wide to its 1,600 in India. Exports dou-
bled to 39,000 units in the year to the end
of March and in June, admittedly an odd
month because of the covid-19 lockdown,
an Enfield 650cc motorcycle topped the
British sales chart.
A sign that it might succeed as an
exporter is that the bikes are becoming
part of popular culture outside India. A
YouTube diary by a young Dutch woman,
for example, begins with her purchase of
an Enfield in Delhi and follows her jour-
ney back to theNetherlands. More than
100,000 people subscribe to her posts.
The urge to cross borders is shared not
only by Enfield but, apparently, its cus-
tomers as well.Kickstart
Royal EnfieldKENT, CONNECTICUT
An Indian reincarnation of a failed British motorcycle brand is going globalTaking the classic route