# Honda exiting the lawnmower business.



## MasterMech (Sep 24, 2017)

Honda to Exit the Lawn Mower Market (rurallifestyledealer.com)

Well, dang.


----------



## Factor (Oct 10, 2019)

Sounds like gas isn't selling.


----------



## Lust4Lawn (Aug 4, 2020)

That is too bad. Strange times when one of the top players in residential lawn mowers bows out. One of the items they site are stricter environmental regulations. This reminds me of when Caterpillar decided to comlpletely ditch the on-road diesel truck engine business.


----------



## MasterMech (Sep 24, 2017)

Factor said:


> Sounds like gas isn't selling.


I don't think it's a matter of gas isn't selling. At all. There are still a LOT of lawns in North America (like mine) that battery electric just doesn't make sense for. Yet.

I do think that the recent California regulations and scuttlebutt of other states rapidly following suit is accelerating the process of sunsetting legacy engines and equipment that does not have a major slice of market share. Unfortunately, that describes the Honda walk-mowers perfectly. Good as they are, the market volume (for gas-powered residential walk-mowers) remains squarely in Toro, MTD and perhaps Husqvarna's court.


----------



## MasterMech (Sep 24, 2017)

Lust4Lawn said:


> That is too bad. Strange times when one of the top players in residential lawn mowers bows out. One of the items they site are stricter environmental regulations. This reminds me of when Caterpillar decided to comlpletely ditch the on-road diesel truck engine business.


You read my mind - but this is a bit different in that when Cat bowed out of the on-highway diesel engine biz, there was a path forward. They couldn't justify the risk involved in investing hundreds of millions into R&D to comply with the new standards, but if they had wanted to, it was an option to bring an updated product to market. The California SORE regs did no such thing. They flat out banned small engines. There was no opportunity to let OEMs and their engineers make the decision if more efficient engines or battery electric was the best way forward. No updated noise thresholds, no tightened emissions standards, just anything under 25HP, F-you, go away. In a state where the cost of living for all but the uber-wealthy is a major concern, they just doubled the purchase price of the average mower. We might even see many residential DIY'rs shift to commercial lawn services as many of the engines powering large walk-behinds, stand-ons, and sit-down zero turns are well over the 25HP threshold.


----------



## Toddskill (5 mo ago)

MasterMech said:


> I don't think it's a matter of gas isn't selling. At all. There are still a LOT of lawns in North America (like mine) that battery electric just doesn't make sense for. Yet.
> 
> I do think that the recent California regulations and scuttlebutt of other states rapidly following suit is accelerating the process of sunsetting legacy engines and equipment that does not have a major slice of market share. Unfortunately, that describes the Honda walk-mowers perfectly. Good as they are, the market volume (for gas-powered residential walk-mowers) remains squarely in Toro, MTD and perhaps Husqvarna's court.


I think this is it, the article says they will continue manufacturing their gx engine line, which as far as I know would still fall under the ban. I think their mowers just fell in a limited/awkward space in the market that's not as profitable as they need to be.


----------



## Victor Von Lawn (5 mo ago)

MasterMech said:


> You read my mind - but this is a bit different in that when Cat bowed out of the on-highway diesel engine biz, there was a path forward. They couldn't justify the risk involved in investing hundreds of millions into R&D to comply with the new standards, but if they had wanted to, it was an option to bring an updated product to market. The California SORE regs did no such thing. They flat out banned small engines. There was no opportunity to let OEMs and their engineers make the decision if more efficient engines or battery electric was the best way forward. No updated noise thresholds, no tightened emissions standards, just anything under 25HP, F-you, go away. In a state where the cost of living for all but the uber-wealthy is a major concern, they just doubled the purchase price of the average mower. We might even see many residential DIY'rs shift to commercial lawn services as many of the engines powering large walk-behinds, stand-ons, and sit-down zero turns are well over the 25HP threshold.


You make a good point that I hadn't thought of--this ban will be a real boon for lawn care companies.
If you are a new home owner, and you buy a house with a big lawn, and then you only find electrics at Home Depot, you will probably hire the pros.


----------



## MasterMech (Sep 24, 2017)

Victor Von Lawn said:


> You make a good point that I hadn't thought of--this ban will be a real boon for lawn care companies.
> If you are a new home owner, and you buy a house with a big lawn, and then you only find electrics at Home Depot, you will probably hire the pros.


The only ones who get a major benefit here are the OEMs and retailers of the electric equipment. They have been handed a massive gift in that they now have greatly increased market demand without the pesky need to make a product that's actually competitive in price and/or performance with existing technology. Think about this, what if we capped the maximum HP of all mowers at about 2HP. What kind of limitations would that impose on quality of cut, capability in thick turf, etc... That's exactly what we're doing.

I wouldn't be surprised to see plug-in electrics make a comeback on small lawns. Lawns big enough to justify riding equipment will probably still be gas-powered, as deploying 25+HP engines on all RLE won't be a big jump. Most of the chassis already have 25Hp engine configs. But gone will be any riding equipment under $3,000. And it's a matter of time before that threshold gets bumped up to 30, 35, 40+ HP.....


----------



## Victor Von Lawn (5 mo ago)

it will sure look funny, seeing the guy mowing his 7000 square-foot lawn with a 25 hp ride on. 😆


----------



## MasterMech (Sep 24, 2017)

Victor Von Lawn said:


> it will sure look funny, seeing the guy mowing his 7000 square-foot lawn with a 25 hp ride on. 😆


No more out of place than a $6k EGo ZTR. 🎤👇


----------



## Buffalolawny (Nov 24, 2018)

Lawn Care is going to be Subscriber based Autonomous Electric Mowers.

Good luck If you are the lucky Tesla, Toyota, Porsche of the lawn care who Who uses Amazon who will deliver to your door.

They will only need a SINGLE Area Rep for Quote, Install, Repair.

You will be pushed to swallow that pill.

And Honda unfortunately is not a Leader in Lawncare in the USA.


----------



## Mightyquinn (Jan 31, 2017)

I look at the announcement as Honda can make more money off of ATV's right now then they can off of mowers so that is why they are making the change. Their residential mower business, I don't think was ever that big so why not covert that over to the ATV's which seem to be selling quite well these days for some reason and I'm sure have a higher margin of profit over the mowers.


----------



## MasterMech (Sep 24, 2017)

Mightyquinn said:


> I look at the announcement as Honda can make more money off of ATV's right now then they can off of mowers so that is why they are making the change. Their residential mower business, I don't think was ever that big so why not covert that over to the ATV's which seem to be selling quite well these days for some reason and I'm sure have a higher margin of profit over the mowers.


It's a shame really because they had some excellent ideas for residential lawn equipment. Many of their tractors were powered by small parallel-twin engines, liquid cooled. So quiet, and powerful enough in their time. That engine was also in some RV generators. Other than having the hydrostatic transmission in the high-end models, none of the walk-behinds struck me as particularly excellent vs some of the alternatives. And catering to the very high-end of the market is a recipe for low-volume sales for sure. Which is why we saw John Deere make a big entry into the RLE entry-level market in the late 90's. We can debate all day about whether Deere should have kept the Sabre name and colors vs. slapping Deere decals on and painting them green and yellow, but the creation of the Sabre line, and later the Lightning platform for RLE (better known as the L100, 100, LA, D100, E100, and now the S100 series, yeah all the same basic tractor.....) is why we still have the more premium X300, X500, and X700 series, plus all the residential ZTRs we see today. They vacuumed up the market share from MTD and AYP and can pretty much do what they want with it.

In Honda's case, if we had seen a few more GC/GCV-level engines and riding machines in the $2-4k range, I think we'd be looking at a very different picture for residential equipment today. Deere pretty much quashed that though with bringing Honda Power Equipment into their C&CE dealerships, while simultaneously exiting the walk-behind residential equipment market.

And yet Stihl (who benefitted the exact same way by Deere throwing in the towel on handheld power equipment, pretty much at the same time they exited the walk-behind market) is bringing to market Ferris/Briggs Power built ZTRs that compete directly with Deere products, both residential AND commercial. Wonder how that's going to play out....


----------

