"Two commercial bankers were having lunch. One was a twenty-year veteran of the finance industry, the other a novice just out of business school. The younger was picking the other’s brain for advice.'Mr. Senior, what usually happens when a person with a lot of money but no experience goes into partnership with a person who has no money but lots of experience?''Either the venture will fail altogether,' advised the senior, 'or ... the partner with the experience will end up with all the money,'" said the Vespa when she met with Wulandart at that night."And why Vespa?" Wulandari began with asking. The she said, "Yes ... Aesthetics. You all know that Vespa was developed from Scooters. There were five golden rules distinguishing scooters from other two-wheelers: a small motor placed near or next to the rear wheel, an enclosed chassis, a body to protect the driver from splashes, two small-diameter wheels and, finally, an automatic-clutch transmission package patented by Salsbury. The vehicles’ unique silhouette could also be added to this list. Scooters were promoted as an alternative to both cars and bicycles: on one hand, they were more agile, maneuverable and less expensive, and on the other, they were more comfortable, safe and universally affordable. Only one more ingredient was missing to truly prepare the soil that would eventually produce the Vespa: Aesthetics. And now, let's hear on what the Vespa will tell us."The the Vespa said, "At the end of March 2017, President Donald Trump announced his intention to tax Vespas in the United States. The real aim of this measure was not to protect the domestic market, instead, was to issue a warning to the trade policies of the European Union.If we consider the economic aspect of this development alongside its cultural implications, Trump’s stance can be interpreted as a telling indicator of the role that certain symbols play in social life. On one hand, it suggests that the Vespa still enjoys international prestige and recognition. On the other hand, while just yesterday the 'two-wheeled insect' was one of the most effective ambassadors of the 'made in Italy' throughout the world—in other words, a product internationally identified with Italy—this move by the world’s most influential politician turned it into something more: an icon representing Europe as a whole.Then why I called Vespa an insect? The Vespa could be maneuvered with ease and minimum effort. The Vespa appeared clean and offered the driver protection from bumps and dirt thanks to complete coverage of the engine parts and a front shield. The bodyshell was practically blasphemy in relation to motorcycle design of the time, but it was fine for scooters, which had already broken away from the dictates of the more aggressive and exuberant motorcycles. Vespa boasted an aerodynamic and slender profile, especially at the back, where its waspish waist gave the scooter its name: indeed Vespa is the italian translation of 'Wasp.'The history of Vespa cannot be separated from the social, political and cultural implications of economic facts such as technological innovation in the field of motorcycles. Social events are always a combination of economic, political and cultural elements that only appear to be distinct because our way of looking at them—our perspective—artificially differentiates among and separates them.The Società Rinaldo Piaggio was established in 1884 in Sestri Ponente (Genoa/Liguria) by Enrico Piaggio and his 19-year-old son Rinaldo to work timber for ships. After only three years (1887), Rinaldo broke with his father to found the company Piaggio & Co. Four partners joined him in this enterprise: Giuseppe Piaggio (Enrico’s brother and a ship-owner), Pietro Costa, Giacomo Pastorino and Nicolò Odero. By the end of the century, Rinaldo had bought up all the company shares. It was a promising period. Italy had entered a positive growth cycle which, fueled by the aid of the mixed banks, brought the country more in line with the most advanced economies.With the outbreak of the First World War (WWI), the Piaggio family began to mobilize for war. The Liguria-based group benefited from the state’s demand for the weapons and goods needed for military campaigns, a demand that changed the face of industry, increasing in particular the size, turnover and technological development of the aviation sector.At the end of the war, the company’s financial statement was unquestionably positive, as it was for all the sectors involved in industrial mobilization: on average, their reported earnings doubled. In the automotive sector, revenues even quadrupled. Piaggio had set out from shipbuilding and proceeded to aeronautics, passing through railways.From the Ethiopian war to the fall of Mussolini, the Piaggio company experienced an extremely positive period of quantitative growth. From the Ethiopian war to the fall of Mussolini, the Piaggio company experienced an extremely positive period of quantitative growth. Fascism granted Rinaldo the same level of favoritism it extended to other enterprises, such as the Terni steel plants, which manufactured a product that was key not only for the country’s military security but also for any industrial development plan it might have pursued. Nevertheless, Piaggio’s bond with Fascism deeply affected the life of the company, contributing to its good fortune and orienting its strategy and structure.World War II was particularly cruel in the Tuscan region and no pain was spared. The industrial conversion the Piaggio company carried out beginning in 1944. What resources fueled the company’s recovery and how did they lead to the invention of the Vespa? The allies began bombing the cities of Pisa, Livorno and Pontedera during the summer of 1943, but the worst was yet to come. 1944 was a year of destruction, death and disaster that touched the civilian population as well, trapped as it was between Anglo-American air strikes and a Nazi retreat that deliberately declared a 'war on civilians,' up to and including planned massacres. The area of Valdera was no exception, and indeed allied bombs destroyed Pontedera in January. The first hit area was the airport, on 6 January, and then the Piaggio plant was struck on the 18th, suffering serious damage. At the beginning of January 1943, first signs of a plan to transfer the Pontedera plant elsewhere began to show. At the beginning of January 1943, first signs of a plan to transfer the Pontedera plant elsewhere began to show. Steps were taken during the spring of 1943 to begin distributing facilities to various areas in the province of Pisa. With the new year, Piaggio began to rebuild its facilities, reassembling the parts of the factory and ensuring the various equipment was operational once again, even as the conflict continued to rage in the North.With the partisan uprising in April 1945 and the end of WWII, all war production activities ceased, and by the beginning of May, the Piedmont plants had already begun manufacturing scooters—the MP5 prototype at first and then its upgrade, the MP6.'When Corradino D’Ascanio’s pencil first sketched the graceful, alluring lines of the Vespa in 1945, the history of the scooters had already begun. That decisive sketch, destined to change the world of two-wheeled transportation and to represent the very idea of 'scooters' in the collective imagination, was the culmination of an evolution that lasted at least three decades. An examination of the various models and styles as well as the tried and tested techniques of the Vespa’s forerunners provides a portrait of the international scooter market on which the Piaggio company was to make its mark. This background grants historical depth to the fortunes of the Pontedera-based company.The scooter differs from the motorcycle in a variety of respects. Generally speaking, it has smaller wheels; a more or less streamlined, step-through frame; a more comfortable riding position that enables drivers to rest their feet on a floorboard rather than requiring them to straddle the vehicle; and practicality. As a motor vehicle, therefore, it does not require any special physical traits or technical skills to be driven.The habit of using the word scooter to denote a vehicle that dashes or 'scoots' probably become more widespread following the appearance of the Autoped in 1915. Equipped with very small wheels, an open, platform-shaped frame and engine over the front wheel, this vehicle was highly reminiscent of a kick scooter, and in fact the driver’s standing position reinforced this impression. The Autoped was produced in New York and circulated in the US until 1921. Thanks to licensing agreements, it also arrived in Britain, sold by UK Imperial Motor Industries, and in Germany under Krupp.The first Scooter Club was established in Paris in 1920 on the crest of the wave of scooter enthusiasm. The Club’s significance should not be underestimated, as it was an important precursor to the better-known Vespa club. The organization’s activities consisted mainly of setting up regularity and speed races on city streets or outings for members. This earliest scooter phase, dominated by the pioneering two-wheelers, concluded with the appearance of the Unibus in Britain in 1920.Unibus represents a turning point, as it already featured a number of stylistic solutions and avant-garde techniques destined to prevail in the following period, including some elements of the Vespa itself: the body was made of a pressed aluminum sheet; the single-cylinder, two-stroke engine was enclosed in a special compartment and, in one of the models, was even mounted beside the rear wheel as in the Vespa; the wheels were smaller; it was equipped with suspensions; and the entire fork up to the handlebars was protected by an aerodynamic shield.The second wave of scooters grew out of the specifics of the American context after the collapse of Wall Street. Motorized transport had existed for at least 15 years, but in this context it had to be adapted to respond to the financial crisis. Manufacturers releasing the second generation of scooters appeared in this moment and succeeded in detaching them from the previous image of a wealthy plaything; it was indeed in the US, some 20 years before Europe, that scooters were able to establish themselves as an inexpensive and highly useful vehicle. Between 1938 and 1946, at least 20 brands appeared.E. Foster Salsbury conceived of the idea of producing a cheerful scooter for the mass market and, together with inventor Austin Elmore, introduced the first Salsbury Motor Glide at the 1935 Boat and Air Show in Los Angeles. Just two years later, a more sophisticated model was introduced and pompously dubbed the DeLuxe High Speed Motor Glide. Next came the Aero, whose name and logo—a pair of large, stylized wings joined together—provide the fundamental key to understanding the history of scooters, namely its ongoing relationship with aeronautics.These new vehicles offered improved performances and were more reliable without losing any of the original nimbleness. These traits were continuously emphasized in American advertising through the introduction of a series of standard communicational messages. Among these was the feminization of these two-wheeled vehicles. The first advertisement, published in a 1936 magazine, showed a comely young woman in shorts and tank top waving from aboard her Motor Glide.In the same period, Norman Siegal—dubbed king of the scooter by Time magazine—invented the Moto-Scoot. Inspired by the Salsbury, Siegal revolutionized the headlight position, incorporating it into the center of the handlebar. This solution was adopted by countless future scooters, including the post-1955 Vespa.In the 1930s, Italy’s motorcycle industry was limited both by strictly economic factors, such as the narrow domestic market, and political ones, such as the regime’s autarchic policies. The fascist regime’s insistence on using exclusively Italian materials and obstructing the mport of foreign materials meant that motorcycle manufacturers were isolated and, to protect their profits, lacked any healthy competition with more adventurous developments outside the country.Before WWII, the Italian industry was dominated by a pentarchy: Guzzi, Gilera, Sertum, Benelli and Bianchi. Generally speaking, the emphasis was on quality over quantity, and these manufacturers produced expensive, luxury or sports motorcycles equipped with sophisticated technology. Not having to compete with foreign models and prices, Italian manufacturers continued to ignore the push towards vehicles designed for a wider public, nonetheless managing to earn good profits without increasing the number of motorcycles on the road.The first company to grasp the possibilities of the lightweight motorcycle industry was Fiat. It was certainly aware of American market trends, as it often sent executives to the US for business trips and training. In 1938, Fiat built the first example of an Italian scooter, one that closely resembled the Cushman, but it was never marketed.Before presenting the Vespa, Enrico Piaggio had tried to produce American scooters under license. It was natural for Piaggio to explore the international market, and quite likely the company was considering a variety of projects and keeping all its options open, from licensed production to production based on original patents. In the end, aeronautical engineer Corradino D’Ascanio’s presence played a vital role in bringing the company around to the latter option.The first Piaggio scooter displayed some key features. Its common name outside the factory walls was Paperino, the Italian translation of Donald Duck. Of course, this was not a random choice. Given that both bore the names of Disney characters, the automatic association with the Fiat Topolino (named after Mickey Mouse) was simply automatic. The name thus encapsulated an entrepreneurial project: just as the aim of the Topolino was to put the country on four wheels, so the Paperino sought to do the same on two.D’Ascanio devised a new design that blended aeronautical, automotive and motorcycle criteria to produce a new MP6 prototype, completing it by the end of the year: this new MP6 was later renamed the Vespa. The Vespa was certainly very simple to use: one could mount and dismount it as easily as a bicycle and it had a step-through frame. It therefore guaranteed maximum comfort by allowing the driver to sit down while driving instead of having to straddle the chassis, as in classic motorcycles. In addition, women felt safer because they had a platform on which to rest their feet. The same option had been provided by previous leaders of the scooter pack, including the Unibus, Salsbury, Cushman, Moto-Scoot, Crocker and the mysterious Fiat exemplar. The fact that these vehicles were suitable for riders in skirts, whether women or the clergy, had become a consolidated cliché of American and European advertising.Piaggio has developed an unprecedented degree of international activity through direct investments abroad. After benefiting from hybridization and the selective adaptation of know-how and technology from other countries of the so-called Western world, the Vespa, functioning as a sort of creative prism, refracted the experience of Pontedera out into the world, acting as an agent of globalization. Viewed through the lens of the Vespa, globalization appears more rhizomatic than we might think. The Italian scooter took those techniques, findings and know-how and sent them flying in different directions; in turn, these forms of knowledge produced new instances of hybridization and selective adaptation in the places where licensees cropped up. This occurred both in sites hosting a peak of advanced capitalism, such as the United Kingdom, and countries such as India that were focused on emancipating themselves from Western colonialism economically and socially after having gained political independence. In India, for example, Bajaj continued to produce scooters after his license had expired. Different entrepreneurial approaches, work cultures, habitus and beliefs met—and sometimes clashed—in this space. Although this encounter did not transform misunderstandings and points of friction into peace, it did help bring a bit of East to the West and some of the West to the East,"concluded the Vespa."And finally, as a closing," said Wulandari, "there are interesting things about Vespa in the Equator. It seems that it has become a habit that wherever you park your Vespa scooter, no one will take it. Likewise, every time you ride your Vespa, whatever the case, no policeman would want to give you a ticket. Therefore, it would seem strange if there was a policeman who insisted on ticketing a pair of Vespa scooters. And Allah knows best."From afar, the Dawn seemed to be approaching, and Wulandari departed singing,Ku bukan superstar, kaya dan terkenal[I'm not a superstar, rich and famous]Ku bukan saudagar, yang punya banyak kapal[I'm not a merchant, who owns lots of ships]Ku bukan bangsawan, ku bukan priayi[I'm not a noble, I'm not a prince]Ku hanyalah orang yang ingin dicintai *)[I'm just someone who wants to be loved]
Citations & Reference:
- Andrea Rapini, The History of Vespa: An Italian Miracle, 2019, Routledge
*) "Bukan Superstar" written by Gumilar Nurochman
