Since it first entered production in 1958, an astounding 110 million Honda Super Cubs have been sold, making it the #1 selling motor vehicle in history. And it’s competition for the best-selling honor isn’t even close. The best-selling car, the Toyota Corolla, has sold 50 million. The F-150? 41 million. The formerly ubiquitous Volkswagen Beetle? About 21.5 million. The revolutionary Model T? Just over 15 million.
If you live in the U.S., the Super Cub being the best-selling vehicle probably surprises you because you’ve likely never seen a Super Cub, given that they were only sold in the U.S. between 1961 and 1974, with a recent re-introduction in the U.S. in 2019.
Back in the sixties, though, the Super Cub was a big hit in the U.S., riding the wave of the hugely popular advertising campaign “You Meet the Nicest People on a Honda,” which depicted normal people and respectable members of society going about their business riding the Super Cub. “Those who would otherwise have rolled their eyes at the word ‘motorcycle,’ and those who previously had no interest in them, soon saw in the motorcycle a new purpose: one of casual and convenient daily transportation.” Source.
In the U.S., sales fizzled in the early 1970s, and Honda stopped selling the Super Cub here. But sales remained strong overseas, especially in Asia.
Why has the Super Cub sold so well? Because it is fuel-efficient, reliable, and cheap (you can buy a new top-of-the-line c125 Super Cub in the U.S. for less than $4,000).
Ownership of a Super Cub has been life-changing for millions of people. “Within the decade, the entire culture of many countries shifted from being isolationist, separate villages and towns and maybe visiting a city once in a lifetime, to liberating untold millions of people to make a day trip to the big city and be back in town before the sun set. What had once been something that people had only read about happening in the ‘rich nations’ like the UK, parts of Europe, and North America was now something very real in their own part of the world.” Source
The Super Cub is super versatile and is known as the “F-150 of the developing world.” This is in part due to the “quite specific—and now famous—requirement was that the motorcycle could be ridden with one hand so that the other could carry a tray of soba noodles.” Source.
Check out the pictures below of the Super Cub’s versatility.
Super Cubs aren’t powerful, though. The earliest Super Cubs had a 50cc engine that produced 4.5hp and had a top speed of 43mph. A post-2018 model 125cc Super Cub cranks out 9.2hp and has a top speed of 65mph.
John- I loved this IFOD. The cultural relativism it sparked, the inclusion of the advertisement and the pictures of folks zoom’n around town. Now can you tell me why insurance commercials try (and usually succeed) at being so funny, when their product is so boring and necessary?