Save Your Money!

 Save Your Money!

If you are looking for cool products to make your rides more enjoyable, or feel more safe, read on!

Collaborations

Listen up MotoReaders... by now, you should know me well enough to know that I'm going to be honest with you. I never intended to get involved with "collabs" or "affiliates"... mainly because I didn't know anything about them or about how much effort I would have to put in to be a "brand ambassador", "affiliate" or "collaborator." Truth is, I figured I'd just write my little blog posts on my tiny little corner of the interwebs, and, if I was lucky... someone out there might actually read them and maybe, just maybe, get something out of them. I never intended to make money from the blog. 

Viking Bags

One day... something weird happened. I got a random contact on my website from Viking Bags. It was a representative from Viking Bags wanting to send me a free bag in return for putting a link to their website on my page. I actually thought it was a scam at first, but sure enough... they sent me a new bag, totally free, and in turn, I did a review of it and then put their link on my site. No money, no job, just an equal exchange- one bag for one review and a link to their site. Easy enough. That was in May of 2024, and I didn't give it much thought after that. This year, Viking once again, sent me another bag to review.

Unik International

In December of 2025, I got an email from Unik International, about becoming an affiliate for their company. Being familiar with the brand, having seen their products in several motorcycle shops, I looked into it. Turns out, that by my becoming an affiliate, my MotoReaders could save 15% off their orders, just by using my link. So, basically, by doing nothing special... other than clicking a link or putting in a code at checkout, someone looking to buy riding gear could save 15 cents off of every dollar they spent... that means you only pay $85 bucks for something that cost $100. That's pretty decent for doing nothing more than clicking a link or putting in a discount code at checkout.

In return for the, potentially new, stream of business that would be generated from my little corner of the interwebs, Unik would give me a small percentage, too. Wait... what? I could potentially earn a few dollars, while my MotoReaders were saving money? Sounds like a win-win for us, so I set it up.

First Manufacturing

Shortly after deciding to retire from my paying job, and well before any of the affiliate stuff got started, I bought myself a new leather riding vest. Now, you may not wear a jacket while you ride, but I can tell you from personal experience (and I can prove it with the 6" scar across my back), that you should, at a minimum, ride with a vest. If I had been wearing a vest when I crashed my Dyna, the leather of the best would have been scratched, instead of my back being sliced open when I hit the ditch. I don't know what I landed on, but I can tell you that my highside crash was violent and something cut me open clean. 

I knew that I was going to be doing a lot more riding in retirement, so I wanted to buy myself something nice, so I clicked the link in an email from First Manufacturing and ordered a vest that fit my style perfectly. I was pretty familiar with the brand, because I've seen their stuff in independent motorcycle shops, as well as, several Harley-Davidson dealerships. I know that their quality is top notch, because my wife and I already had some old vests from them (which I wasn't wearing that fateful day when I decided to ignore a "DANGEROUS CURVE AHEAD" sign). 

After becoming an affiliate for Unik, I decided to apply to be an affiliate for First Mfg, too. After all, I really like my vest and I know that it is very high quality. Next thing I know, they accepted my application and boom! Just like that, my MotoReaders got another link and discout code to save money. For First Mfg, though... my MotoReaders get a crazy 25% off! That's nothing to scoff at, folks. For a $100 vest... you only have to pay $75! As for your old pal, I get a small kickback. Not too shabby for just adding a link to my site. 

Sena Communication 

I decided to look into another product that I absolutely love- Sena Comms and, in February of this year, I got the thumbs up from them. They even sent me a new Outrush 2 helmet for free, to review. In return for my efforts, as an independent contractor for them (they do things a little different than the others), my MotoReaders get 10% off. Now, you might be thinking, "only 10%"? But, let me tell you- good, high quality comms are not cheap. Sure, you can buy comms that cost less, but as I've said before, good products aren't cheap, and cheap products aren't good. With my first Sena, the 20S Evo, I was blown away by how well it worked. My good friend and I took a motorcycle road trip a few years ago and we talked for hours on our Senas. The battery life is incredible, the sound quality is excellent and, when I'm out riding solo and Mrs. MotoWriter calls, she can hear me perfectly clear. The Sena pairs to my phone easily and quickly and doesn't lose connection- an extremely important feature if there's an emergency. The new Outrush 2 helmet is even better than my 20S Evo. The sound quality is exceptional and the helmet is very comfortable. I still use my 20S in my Nolan helmet, and even though it is 4 years old, it still works as flawlessly as it did when I took it out of the package. 

In my opinion, based on my real life experiences, having quality comms is as important as wearing proper gear. Even if you don't listen to music while riding, having turn-by-turn directions from GPS when you're navigating to a new out of the way diner, or being able to call for help when you've laid your bike down on a solo ride in the middle of nowhere is crucial. Sena gives me a small percentage on every purchase, but for my MotoReaders, 10% is significant, because if you haven't noticed, Sena products rarely go on sale. Even if they do, you can save an additional 10% off using my code. 

Why spend more, when you don't have to?

Look, I've never been one to solicit products, and I'm damn sure not going to start now, but if you are in the market for some fresh leather gear, luggage or comms, why wouldn't you save your hard earned cash? With all the craziness going on in the world and prices going up on everything, saving 10, 15 or 25 percent on products that you were already going to buy anyway, just makes sense. I'm not telling you to buy anything, but I am saying, that if you're going to, don't pay full price when you don't have to. Click the links on the right side of the page to start saving with your old pal, The MotoWriter.

Save money, buy gas, and get riding MotoReaders... until next time...

Ride Safe and Save Money!

Here's those links again:

Unik International - 15% off

First Mfg. - 25% off

Sena Comms - 10% off

MotoReview- Unik Leather Gloves

MotoReview- Unik Int'l Full Finger Gloves

Greetings MotoReaders! As promised... I present to you, my review of the Unik International, leather full finger gloves (SKU 8163.00 in size Large). 

Let's get right into it... 

Customer Service

Before I review the gloves themselves, I want to be clear that these are not the gloves that I initially ordered. Shortly after placing my first order, I was contacted by their Sales Executive, Fawad Khilji from Dover, NJ (USA), who informed me that I would be getting a full refund for my order, as the gloves that I ordered had been discontinued and the order could not be fulfilled. But, Fawad was very friendly and helpful (and super fast on refunding my money), and within a few moments, and after a couple of emails, I found another pair of gloves to try. He verified that they had them in stock and in my size, then he had them sent out within an hour of placing the new order. As far as I'm concerned- that is first-rate customer service. 

The Gloves- First Impression

The gloves arrived quickly via UPS and upon my initial inspection, I was impressed. The first thing I noticed was the feel and smell of them. These are real leather, and they smell like it. Leather, coffee and the smell of bacon sizzling in the pan are some of the best odors to grace our nostrils, so it's fair to say that I was pretty happy smelling leather when I opened the bag, instead of the chemical odor that sometimes accompanies new gear. The gloves have a nice weight to them- they aren't cumbersome, but they are just heavy enough that you feel like they are made of good materials. The fingers have small perforations, which I would assume are intended for breathability. The holes are small, inline and don't detract from the look, but I'm not sure how much they will help in keeping your mitts cool in the summer- only time will tell on that one. The palm of the gloves have reinforced areas and the design fits my hands well. The reinforced areas aren't bulky and over padded like you find in some gloves; these feel natural when my hands are on the grips. The backside of the gloves feature 3 knuckle pads, which seem to be effectively placed and some reinforcement stitching across the flat of the hand, which, if I'm being totally honest (and I am), give the gloves a Mickey Mouse kind of look if you think about it too hard. While I don't know why they only put three, instead of four, knuckle pads on these gloves, the design works and I feel like the pads are placed in such a way that my knuckles would be protected in the event of a strike, and the gloves don't look silly or over-designed. 

A quick look inside the cuff and I noticed a label that said "Made in Pakistan" and a very nice, soft lining inside the gloves. The lining, made with DuPont Kevlar fiber was a happy surprise for me, since that wasn't listed in the description. A good weight leather outer shell with palm reinforcements, paired with a Kevlar lining means these gloves should offer pretty good abrasion protection, and the velcro adjustment strap at the wrist should keep the gloves from sliding off your hand, in the event of an unplanned slide. 

First Ride

On the website, one of the features noted is the "touch technology" in the fingertips and, upon initial testing with my phone... it seemed to work pretty well... until the first ride. Now, I don't seek out this feature on gloves since I intentionally try to avoid electronic devices while I ride my motorcycle. Having the ability to navigate a touch screen does help, though... as I just added a Quad Lock to my Road King, and I like to listen to music through my Sena while riding. For other folks, especially those riding the newest Harley-Davidson Touring bikes with giant touchscreen displays, touch tech in gloves would almost be a necessity. 

Donning the gloves for the first time, I noticed that the cuffs were a bit tight for my hand to get into them, but they fit extremely well once on. Getting a larger size might make putting the gloves on a bit easier, but then the glove would be too big, so I'm sure that they will break-in over time and with continued use. The fingers were a bit longer and fatter than I like (see photos below), but the reality is, there is no standard for finger lengths and widths, so in designing a glove, a company has to make the most logical size to accommodate most hands, so I'm not put off by this... I'm simply making an observation. The gloves felt good and I wore them all day, on a ride of just over 250 miles. 

The first thing I noticed when I stopped for gas, which was just a few miles into the ride, was that the "skin" on the index finger and thumb for the touch technology was already coming off (see photos). Again, this isn't a deal breaker for me, but I also don't have a touchscreen display on my dash either. For full transparency- I am currently running Avon Custom Countour grips on my Road King and stock levers. The grips have a textured surface, but the levers are smooth- neither of which should have abraded the tips of these fingers enough to remove this "skin", so I assess this to be a manufacturing flaw. Not great, considering this a featured selling point for these gloves. It didn't take long for the skin to be completely worn off, rendering the touch tech feature completely useless. 

Final Thoughts

For full disclosure- as part of being a newly chosen brand ambassador (which might get revoked after they read this review), I did get these gloves at a pretty decent discount. Not to mention, they were also listed on sale, for 50% off of their list price of $59.99. With tax and shipping, I had less than $30 bucks out of the bank account for these gloves, which is a pretty decent deal for a pair of genuine leather riding gloves. These gloves aren't perfect, and the touch tech was a bit of a disappointment, but I've spent almost as much for a pair of Mechanix brand gloves that don't offer a fraction of the protection as these and are made of synthetic leather-like materials, instead of real leather like the Uniks.

The bottom line? Well, for these, I say... to each their own. I can't in good conscience recommend these gloves to just anyone, but I can recommend them to anyone who doesn't need touch technology in their gloves. The leather itself is worth the price I paid for these gloves. Add in the knuckle protection, the reinforced palms, the quality of the stitching and the overall comfort and wearability of these gloves, $30 is a deal. With that said, my recommendation to Unik, is that they leave these on sale at 50% off until they can get that fingertip issue resolved, as I would be highly agitated if I dropped $60 for a pair of gloves that had touch technology only to see it flake off in the first 15 miles of the first ride with them. My other recommendation for Unik is that they drop the touch technology "feature" on the listing, and list the Kevlar lining as a primary feature, instead.

I'm sure that, with their exceptional customer service, I could have had my money refunded, or had the gloves replaced within a few days, but to be honest, I really don't care that much- I don't need touch tech and I didn't buy these gloves for that feature. I chose to buy gloves as my first purchase for a couple of reasons- first, gloves are relatively inexpensive compared to jackets, vests, chaps, etc. Second, gloves require complex stitching, the right combination of materials and the right design elements to make a quality product. Quite honestly, you can learn a lot about a company's quality control standards, material selections and design priorities based on a pair of their gloves. 

Overall, I give these gloves a thumbs up for quality of stitching, overall design and comfort. I rode all 250+ miles with these gloves on and my hands stayed comfortable all day. For the touch tech feature- if you specifically want, or need, touch technology to control or adjust your digital touch screen display, look for a different pair of gloves, but be prepared to pay significantly more for them. 

As I've said before, I'll never recommend a product or service to my MotoReaders that I wouldn't personally use, so if someone at Unik reads this review and decides that I'm not the best person to have in their brand ambassador program, then so be it. Until then, if you want to snag a pair of gloves, or any other leather gear from them, hit the logo on the right side of this page (or click here) to get 15% off of your order.

Stay tuned for more reviews... until then,

Ride safe and make good choices!

Unik Leather

Brand Ambassador-ing

Hello MotoReaders! I hope you had, or are having, a great Christmas and holiday season!

I just wanted to take a moment to let you all know that Unik International reached out to me a week or so ago and invited me to be a brand ambassador for them. I know the brand well, having seen their products in various stores. While I didn’t have any of their gear, personally, I know several people that do and they are quite pleased with the quality of it, so I decided to take a look and see what was up. After reading “the fine print”, which was pretty straightforward, I decided to do a quality check for myself. 

No matter what, I want my readers to know that they can trust my opinion and referrals, so I will never recommend or endorse a product to you, that I wouldn’t buy, or use, myself. I decided to start small, but strategically, for my initial product test. I figured that the best product to QC was a pair of gloves because I am very hard on gloves. I ordered a pair of their full finger gloves and now I’m just waiting for them to arrive. Since I just ordered them, I obviously can’t do a review of the gloves yet, but I can tell you that their website was easy to navigate and they have a LOT of products to peruse. I will do a full review of the gloves once I get my mitts on, and in, them so be sure to check back soon for that. 

Since I bought them as part of their ambassador program, I got a bit of a discount and in return, the company provided me with a link for my loyal MotoReaders to save some money, too. Even though I haven’t had a chance to try these gloves yet, I do know that the company is well established and that many of you already have their products, so I decided to go ahead and share the link with all of you, here. I also added it to the right sidebar of my page for easy access while you are perusing other posts.

Be on the lookout for a follow-up post after I’ve had a chance to check these things out, but in the meantime, feel free to click the link below for 15% off your order.

Click this link to get the MotoWriter 15 % discount!