Chopper Powersports: a journey of passion and growth

When I ran into Justin Ogg and Nate McNeilly at the Polaris Dealer Meeting in Nashville, Tennessee, last summer, they were full of passion and energy and excited about opening a second location. In the adrenaline-soaked world of powersports, dealers must possess enthusiasm and energy, traits this dynamic duo has in common.

Chopper Powersports has carved its niche in central Minnesota, as Ogg and McNeilly share a strong passion for motorcycles, racing and off-roading. As we delve into their backgrounds and journeys, the story of Chopper Powersports unfolds.

From minibikes to co-ownership

Justin Ogg, co-owner, traces his roots in powersports back to his early years when he found joy in riding minibikes, dirt bikes and anything equipped with a motor. His journey into the automotive industry eventually led him back to the powersports segment. In 2017, he and Nate McNeilly acquired Chopper City Sports in Fridley, Minnesota, setting the stage for Chopper Powersports’ growth journey.

“I started at the wee age of (he was so young, he doesn’t remember)… riding minibikes, dirtbikes and snowmobiles – anything with a motor had my attention.” As Ogg got older, his passion for motorcycles remained, but he initially decided to go into the automotive industry. He says a sales manager at the dealership where he worked left to follow his passion to be a sales manager at a local motorsports dealership.

“[This sales manager] encouraged me to go along with him. I wasn’t emotionally attached to selling cars by any stretch of the imagination. I figured I was young enough (in my early 20s) to make some money and have some fun by selling fun, and I decided to give it a shot. It didn’t take long to get settled into the industry. And here we are 25 years later.” It was an overnight success story that many can relate to.

“This is an industry driven by passionate enthusiasm. I’ve made my life here; all my friends are here, and I even met my wife here, so I’ve been surrounded by this industry for the last 25 years.”

Ogg says he sold a motorcycle to his future wife. “She actually bought a motorcycle from me in 2002, I believe. It was a CBR600. A few kids later, she’s still a go-fast girl who loves to ride and loves me. So we have that in common,” he says wryly.

A couple of years after Ogg started working at a motorsports store as a sales manager, they hired McNeilly as a sales consultant. “We immediately hit it off,” Ogg recalls. “We were just a couple of ‘motoheads’ and adrenaline junkies who were similar in age and had a lot of similar interests outside of work.” The two remained friends even after Nate left to pursue other avenues in a different industry.

Ogg says he was reunited with McNeilly about ten years ago when he returned to work at the dealership. “[Nate] came back and worked with us part-time. And we finally came together to make bigger plans and said, ‘Let’s buy this thing.’”

The back 40

McNeilly grew up with a background similar to Ogg. His family owned a farm in central Minnesota with 40 acres, tractors, snowmobiles and dirtbikes. “I was always out back riding something. And then I got into racing motocross for a while, and that led to racing snowmobiles.”

McNeilly echoes what Justin said about becoming friends immediately. “We hit it off and had a lot of fun riding and racing together. All of that kind of led us to where we are now.”

Dealership dynamics and growth

McNeilly and Ogg started planning to buy the Fridley, Minnesota, Polaris dealership, Chopper City Sports, back in 2015. However, finalizing everything took much longer, and the deal closed in April 2017. Closing on the second location in Maple Plain, Minnesota, happened much quicker.

McNeilly says they started conversations about buying the second store in March last year. The deal closed on July 1, 2023.

The partners finalized the deal around the Polaris Dealer Meeting last summer. “A lot of the negotiations happened in May,” says McNeilly. “And some talks happened around the Polaris show (June). We heard that he was ready to go when the show started. So everything went quickly from there.”

Expansion plan

With the original location in Fridley, the second Chopper Powersports location is in Maple Plain, Minnesota, which, according to the two partners, is a great area with a higher median income than the other store.

“It’s a phenomenal area of the Twin Cities on the West Metro, where there’s typically higher median household incomes,” McNeilly shares. “People are well-established in this area, and we feel that the upside of this location is very good.”

The partner said that before they took over the Maple Plain store, it was not performing its best, so they plan to use their knowledge and skill to turn it around like their other location in Fridley.

“As for the footprint, it’s bigger propertywise than the other store,” McNeilly adds. “But it was underperforming quite a bit.” The Maple Plain location currently has eight full-time employees, and the partners plan to keep most of the staff onboard. “We’re keeping most of the staff,” says McNeilly. “Everyone’s doing pretty well, but we plan to get them some training, which is what they really need. And we are looking to add to our team here. They do need some help in certain areas. Especially once the word gets out that we are involved and the service is much better than it used to be, we will definitely need some more staff to help out.”

Both locations cater to Polaris as the primary powersports line. Still, both stores also carry some supplemental brands for products such as go-karts, electric scooters, trailers and even outdoor power equipment.

“We are also a service center for Taiga,” says Ogg. “We’re a service center for their personal watercraft and electric snowmobiles, and the Maple Plain location does have three lawnmower lines. We have Cub Cadet, Scag and Walker mowers.”

Back to the future

Ogg notes that the past two years, ’21 and ’22, have been some of the strangest they’ve ever experienced in retail sales. “They’ve been excellent for business, and from an inventory standpoint, nobody’s had to worry about interest payments or anything like that because they didn’t have much inventory. But now we’re going back to pre-Covid times. 2019 is the benchmark everyone uses to measure their business now.”

Ogg says that with the additional location, their customers come from all over the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, and even stretched into parts of western Wisconsin. He adds that they’re also excited about some of the new side-by-sides, such as the Polaris Expedition. “It’s the latest and greatest, with all the technology, all the cool new features kind of all rolled into one. Most people have been extremely excited about it. And we’ve yet to hear any negative feedback on the machine other than they’re relatively hard to get.”

Ogg concludes that they will focus on selling more and getting training in the year ahead. “We had this in the back of our mind for a while. For quite some time, as we knew that the inventory levels were coming back, we knew we had to be prepared to scale back up and get back to work in regard to putting our selling shoes on. Before, the consumer took whatever you had. Well, now, most dealers have anything and everything available to them. So, we must return to selling on value, passion and enthusiasm.”