"For all of you new ST dreamers:
Someone please tell me why a publicly traded company would sink millions to design and develop a new model of motorcycle in order to sell a couple thousand models, most of which are not sold in the current model year produced but at a later year at a deep discount. Those that don't think the sport-touring niche is small to begin with and probably shrinking really need to wake up. We've never represented a very large segment of riding, especially in the US, aka the land of the cruisers."
Sure I can, with pleasure;
BMW comes up with brand new, (not updated, designed from top to bottom) new design, millions spend, 6cylinder gt1600 with the whole 9 yards. That PROVES there is market for sport tourers which gt1600 is. I don't look anything but reality. No statistics, he or she said's.... Bmw did this, yamaha updated theirs... Motoguzzi, kawasaki, ducati all have their tourers. If there is no market or the market is small (some claim here) basically, they are stating, indirectly, that all these companies are stupid. Which they are NOT! These facts shows that there is still a PROFITABLE MARKET.. even for a brand new development cost. No one here yet to disprove this fact here in my opinion, they just come up with FUNNY things.... like..... "there is no market look at the statistics....(for the 50th time)"
Now honda did the same (came up with a new design) but they sucked soooo big with their vfr1200f, that it sunk worst than titanic, just because the fact that they did not listen the customers and they did their own thing instead. It is not a bad engine or a bad bike but it doesn't have what people want and it has some things what people don't care much. Result is a disaster. Some will defend (employee or kid syndrome here again) that it is not a disaster but (again 50x time) there is no market....
Lastly; many claim updated cost millions... That I have to say that they don't know what they are talking about... That is SO UNTRUE... To update a heated grip or a cruise control will cost honda NOTHING. They already have the grip, bike and the engineers. They are already there. Please don't fool yourselves... If you want to change the engine size, yes, it is costly. But that is not the same if you want to change the signal light from yellow to red or to put a better aerodynamic windshield.
So the conclusion is; honda sold st1300 very good at the beginning many loved it, than they did not do any update to the bike almost for 11 years and people chose other brands. Kawasaki, yamaha, bmw (2 tourers actually rt1200r and gt1600), ducati, triumph, motoguzzi all have updated bikes and people tend to choose them. I still do believe ST1300 is an awesome platform and with updates it can ruin many other brands with a heart beat.
NOTE; I forget to mention that beside the gt1600, which is a new design, they also updated rt1200r tourer almost every year..... now it has everything except a microwave oven... But of course bmw is soooo stupid that they didn't know that there is no market or maybe they are getting their update or development money from the ALIENS, so it doesn't really cost them billions and billions like it does to honda... Our friends should tell them that they should stop updating their bikes or at least for the love of god not to develop new ones like the gt1600.... THERE IS NOOO MARKET......