Having a dealer is almost always going to be a better way, because many people just want to bring the bike in and have whatever it needs, taken care of. When it comes to buying, many, myself included want to actually SEE it, sit on it, feel it, ride it, not just look at a picture and then go, ok, yah I think that'll work. For that kind of $$ I want to KNOW.
As for sales, if the company is responsive, answers phone calls, and you can talk to a person then it'd probably work. What most people despise is when you can't get in touch with anyone, or worse, they come at you with that big greasy ass foot long used car salesman smile, but the moment they get your money, you can't get in touch with anyone anymore. Energica has never been this way, even now with their issues, you can still get people to answer the phone or reply to an e mail. If they went to a internet sales thing I don't think it'd harm too bad, thats pretty much how it worked to this point, except for those who actually DID live near a dealer and were able to go in and see one, touch it etc. I honestly think they'd do a LOT better with dealers but what comes next remains to be seen.
The market for electric bikes is just too small for a stand alone dealership at this point, IMO, unless it was something like a shop in a strip mall, with a few bikes, a few people working at, a mom and pop type of thing I think would work exceptionally well, not a big dealership type of thing, they just don't have the thruput yet to support that kind of showroom. As a side, they could also work on other models of electric bikes as well, the Zero's and Live Wires IF those manu's would allow it.
Aaron