I am not sure on the margins and it depends where you live I suppose. Having a dealer network is more than just service and markups though. A good dealer network can do localized marketing and outreach, especially to folks who are not early adopters and willing to make the change to a non-ice bike.
EVs generally in the US are suffering from many things but among them is a strong anti-EV press sentiment which sort of aligns EVs with one kind of politics or another. Local supporting dealers who are in communities serving those communities can do a lot to overcome this. Particularly with their core customers. In dealerships Starks can be seen as a good competitive bike not some symbol of some wokeness internet conspiracy or whatever the politics flavor of the day is.
And more than that, with production reaching upwards of a 1000 bikes per month, dealers can act like an inventory buffer in market fluctuations and directly serve customers in varied geographies. The internet is flat space un-tuned to localities. Plus, many customers are not willing to part with 10k for a mail order bike on the internet even though Stark has a pretty good reputation.
I am not a dealership fanboy but I think it would be short sighted --at least in the US which is currently one of Stark's largest markets-- to think the short term profit boost of a few bikes on the front end will offset the potential to really grow the brand in a solid way in varied markets. Even old well known companies like Nike have stumbled in failing to recognize how dealerships/resellers serve the overall business and often are more than just profit skimming middlemen.
