The doings of big corporations are largely beyond the understanding of those outside the company’s inner workings, so the news of Yamaha selling its California headquarters in favor of a move to Georgia leaves a lot of questions that we can only speculate about. But the crux of the news here, despite it being beyond our pay grade, is that Yamaha is moving its U.S. HQ from CA to GA, a transition which will take the next couple years to complete.
Look, companies move facilities all the time. And it’s not abnormal for a company to have its home base in California for design purposes, just as it’s not abnormal for a company to have its manufacturing facilities in the south or southeast. From an operational perspective, it makes a whole lot of sense to combine A and B, and it seems that Yamaha is doing just that.
In the move, Yamaha is selling off its 25 acre California campus. It’s a location the brand has owned since 1978 and which has been Yamaha’s U.S. headquarters since 1979, so the sale probably isn’t something they take lightly. Apparently, the move isn’t purely profit-driven, though it’s hard to not think it’s a big part of the decision.
How this will pan out as far as product output goes is something we will keep a close eye on. The brand killed off the “pure sport” YXZ1000R side-by-side last year, and the ATVs are fantastic even in spite of their ancient bones. Hopefully this operational move means good – and new – things are coming from Yamaha.
