Harley-Davidson->ke300 didn’t exactly set sales records with its 2014 performance like other bike manufacturers, but the American bike brand still posted healthy sales returns, which really is all the company ever wanted in the first place.

For its 2014 fiscal year, Harley reported selling 267,999 motorcycles, a 2.7-percent increase from its sales numbers (260,839 bikes sold) in 2013. The increased sales allowed Harley to improve its sales revenue to 7.8 percent, moving up from $5.26 billion in 2013 to $5.57 billion in 2014. All together, Harley’s net profit of $844.6 million was a significant level up to the $734 million in profit it made in the previous year.

According to Harley, the bikes largely responsible for the uptick in sales include the Road Glide, Ultra Low, Ultra Limited Low, CVO Street Glide->ke1822,Freewheeler and Street models. Its sales volume in the US, where it sold 171,079 bikes in 2014, helped the company continue its long-standing market share dominance - 53 percent - for bikes with more than 600cc on tap.

Even its business outside the US also reported positive growth, even if it wasn’t as big as the company had anticipated. For the year, Harley saw its sales numbers overseas increase from 91,976 bikes sold in 203 to 96,920 sold in the most recent year. The European, Japanese, and Latin American markets were identified as the places where Harley saw increased sales.

Looking forward, the company is expecting to see its growth continue into the new year with expectations of selling anywhere from 282,000 to 287,000 models in 2015. With Harley's continued growth and expansion into other markets, those numbers could very well end up becoming conservative estimates.

That's pretty much in play, more so now that Harley has laid the foundation for new models and new programs to arrive this year.

Click past the jump to read more about Harley's 2014 fiscal year report.

Why it matters

For all the success other bikemakers have had in the US, none of them can still flex its muscles quite like Harley-Davidson.

This doesn't come as a surprise because you can't get any more American as Harley-Davidson. The brand's popularity in its home country is unparalleled. There's no denying that and it will likely remain the same for as long as Harley continues to crank out those big, beautiful cruisers that has enthralled American riders for generations.

I don't know if there will ever come a point where Harley-Davidson won't sell as well as it does in the US. But what's really impressive about the company's 2014 sales numbers is its popularity in foreign markets.

The brand is close to selling 100,000 units in a given year outside the US. That's pretty remarkable considering that a lot of Harley's competitors have yet to sell over 60,000 units a year in the world.

The world may continue to evolve, but one thing appears to be a constant. Harley-Davidson is still as popular as ever, and if the company takes full advantage of this sales momentum, you can be sure that it's going to have bigger gains in the future.