Breaking the Mold: Buell's Transparent Journey to the Super Cruiser

While the rest of the industry plays hide-and-seek with their development, orchestrating perfect reveals and keeping riders in the dark until the big unveiling, we've thrown the garage doors open. We've invited you—our riders and enthusiasts—into the raw, unfiltered reality of bringing the Super Cruiser to life.

The old playbook says protect your designs, hide your prototypes, control the narrative. Sure, there are reasons the industry does this—IP protection, managing expectations, keeping competitors guessing. But here's the thing: at Buell, we're not interested in playing by their rules.

The Question That Changed Everything

“How do we give people what they actually want in a bike?”

Buell Super Cruiser

The community wanted big power, big torque, and big personality in a new, high-performance motorcycle—all without cutting corners. As a boutique, hand-built motorcycle brand with limited resources, this meant we couldn't afford to follow the traditional approach of keeping development activity behind closed doors.

The Courage to Be Transparent

Buell Super Cruiser prototype at the start of its assembly process.

Product development has never been a straight path. Fresh ideas are easily imagined, but the reality of technical requirements, challenges, setbacks, and breakthrough moments shape the end product into something imperfect but truly special. By opening our doors during the Super Cruiser's development, we've shown you the prototype iterations, the suspension testing with Fox Factory, the refinements based on real-world rider feedback—all of it.

This transparency required courage. It meant showing our work in progress, acknowledging when we needed to pivot or refine, all while continuing to grow through our 2022 brand relaunch. Most importantly, this decision meant being honest about the challenges of creating something that the Buell team truly believed in.

Behind the Build: How We Actually Make Magic Happen

Other manufacturers won't let you peek behind the curtain. We're different. We can't show you every secret, but we can give you a front-row seat to the real work that transforms dreams into the machine that'll be sitting in your garage.

Here's what we've shared with you since the concept was unveiled in February of 2023. No sugar-coating, no corporate polish:

Concept Development

Where your dreams and our engineering obsession collide. The Super Cruiser™ Roland Sands Design® collaboration was where we first said, "let's build this thing."

Design Exploration

Taking the concept Super Cruiser™, a wish list, and making it real. The Super Cruiser Prototype 1 was our first shot at translating our community’s support for the Cruiser into metal and muscle.

Engineering Solutions

Making the promises actually work. Prototypes 2 and 3 showed the evolution—dialing in suspension, perfecting the frame, getting every detail right.

Real-World Testing

Putting our theories through hell. We pushed the Super Cruiser to its limits in conditions that other cruisers on the market wouldn’t dare to go.

Relentless Refinement

Because "good enough" isn't in our vocabulary. Height tweaks, fender adjustments, mirror positioning. We obsessed over details that matter to the ride.

Production Reality

Moving from garage prototype to your driveway. Validating every process to make sure what you get matches what we promised.

Launch

Getting the Super Cruiser to riders who refuse to settle while building out the accessories and options that make it truly yours.

Why We Don't Keep Secrets

This isn't some marketing stunt or feel-good transparency theater. We're building a tribe of riders who get it, who understand that the machine you choose has a story worth the telling.

Riders deserve to trust the people who build their bit of freedom.

When you fire up your Super Cruiser, you'll know exactly why that frame looks the way it does. You'll feel every bump and understand the punishment that the team at Buell and Fox endured in suspension testing. That throttle response you're addicted to? You watched us chase perfection through countless dyno sessions until we got it exactly right.

Most brands want to sell you a fantasy. We'd rather share the reality, because the reality is pretty damn impressive.

What We Promise, We Deliver

Building a bike that works for every rider is demanding, messy, and never perfect. But that's exactly what makes it worth doing, and your involvement in this journey is what makes the end result so satisfying for all of us.

Much as it's a novelty in our industry, radical transparency isn't a marketing tactic for us, and the Super Cruiser isn't just another bike we're trying to sell you. This process has become a part of who we are. It's a commitment we've made publicly, with you watching our every step. The proof isn't in our promises but in the prototypes you've seen, the testing footage we've shared, and the engineering challenges we've tackled out in the open.

You've been on this ride with us from day one, and that means everything.

The Road Ahead

Our journey with the Super Cruiser doesn't end with its debut; we're just getting started.

We'll continue to share the evolution of the Super Cruiser and future Buell innovations because when you buy a Buell motorcycle, you're becoming part of our story—and it's our pleasure to unfold that story for a community that values authenticity as highly as we do.

This is motorcycle development reimagined. This is Buell.