By James Chevrette
Not every retailer or manufacturer who sells motorcycle audio belongs in the category. That is the blunt assessment of Carlos Ramirez, owner of NVS Audio, a specialty shop that has built one of the most respected motorcycle audio operations in the country.
“Retailers or manufacturers who don’t understand proper fitment or audio performance at highway speeds should stop selling these products. If you can’t demo what you’re selling or lack the training to understand the nuances of motorcycle audio, you’re doing the customer a disservice.”
“There are manufacturers getting into this space who have never trained a single dealer,” Ramirez said. “They show up, drop product, and disappear. This hurts everyone.”
The retailers who thrive in motorcycle audio, Ramirez contends, are the ones willing to invest the way the best manufacturers do. He points to brands like Cicada Audio, American Hard Bags, and Hertz Audio as examples of companies that have earned their place in his shop by supporting the dealers who sell their products. Hertz recently demonstrated this commitment by releasing the SX 690H for Harley. It is currently the only aftermarket direct drop-in speaker solution available for the rear saddlebags of 2024-2026 Harley-Davidson models. Rockford Fosgate holds the OEM position on those bikes, but no aftermarket direct-fit option exists from them. Hertz saw the application and solved it.
Not every manufacturer operates that way. Ramirez described receiving a product from an unnamed manufacturer that marketed its line as motorcycle-ready but did not physically bolt into a Harley-Davidson. The product had apparently never been tested in the actual application it was designed for. “That is the problem,” he said. “It undermines dealers who are doing this seriously.”
The Art of the Demo
Walk into NVS Audio and you will find between six and ten motorcycles set up for demonstration, each representing a different price and performance tier. That is not an accident, it is the foundation of Ramirez’s entire sales philosophy.
A customer can sit on a bike, hear what a $2,500 system sounds like, then hear what a $5,000 system sounds like, and make an informed decision. The moment they decide, Ramirez can begin the install the next day, because every solution on the demo floor is also stocked in-house.
“If you cannot demo it and you cannot deliver it, you are not really in the business,” he said.
NVS Audio’s minimum entry point sits around $2,500. Ramirez does not offer lower-tier solutions, and he is direct about this with customers. Some walk out and find a cheaper alternative elsewhere, but most come back.
“They went somewhere else, got a $1,500 system, and it does not sound anything like what they heard here,” he said. “They never actually listened to a $1,500 system before they bought it. Then the customer is disappointed by the performance.”
The shops selling sub-$1,500 systems, in his view, are also the ones not investing in demos, training, or inventory. The two problems go together.
Inventory as a Closing Tool
The conventional model in aftermarket audio puts inventory at the distributor level, with shops ordering products as orders come in. Ramirez runs the opposite way. He carries his own stock deliberately; this is his competitive advantage.
Supply chain disruptions and backorder delays can cost a shop a sale. A customer who must wait two weeks for parts has time to reconsider. Ramirez eliminates that window entirely. The decision gets made in the showroom. The bike goes in the next morning.
“Speed matters,” he said. “When someone is excited, you move. You do not tell them to check back in a week.”
DSP Is Non-Negotiable
Every motorcycle Ramirez works on receives a digital signal processor. No exceptions. His analogy for customers is straightforward: if you had the motor built, would you skip the tune?
Time alignment is particularly important to Ramirez. Because a rider is not centered between speakers from front to rear, soundstage positioning requires time correction. Ramirez has found that proper time alignment substantially improves mid-bass performance, an area where motorcycle audio systems frequently fall short without DSP.
“A DSP is not an upgrade,” he said. “It is a missing ingredient. If you leave it out, you are not done.”
The Radio Question
Ramirez has been tracking head unit options for the Harley-Davidson market closely. He pre-ordered two units of the Precision Power (PPI) 7.7-inch single-DIN CarPlay radio, and he has since sold twelve. At $1,000 retail, it is not an entry-level purchase, but he describes it as the real deal: a unit that delivers on its promises and functions correctly for the application.
He has also been impressed with the Boss Audio Elite radio, specifically for its integrated DSP.
Riders Buying from Riders
Ramirez’s final point is harder to quantify but may be the most important. Motorcycle audio customers are not car audio customers. They ride. They care about their bikes in a way that goes beyond acoustics, and they can tell within minutes whether the person selling them a system understands motorcycles or is reading from a spec sheet.
“These customers want to buy from someone who gets it,” Ramirez said. “The nuances of installing on a motorcycle, weatherproofing, vibration, the way a rider actually experiences sound at speed. If you do not know those things, customers know right away.”
Shops that belong in motorcycle audio, in his view, are shops where someone on staff rides. Where the knowledge is genuine, not borrowed. Where the investment in demos and inventory reflects a belief in the category, not just another labor job.
The ones just dabbling? He is not worried about them. He has seen how that story ends.
