And if you think a S-class Mercedes is incomparably superior to a Tesla Model S, but the Tesla S is still outselling it by a wide margin, just imagine what's going to happen when Tesla's next iteration of a luxury sedan gets even closer to the Merc!
Did you actually check where a Model S starts after tax credits vs. the base price of a S-Class?
As we don't have data here we're thrown back to opinions.
I would think Tesla users buy a Model S for the electric drive and it's an upper class car and for the branding ("I drive a Tesla, I'm cool")
People buy a S-class because of the luxary and thebranding ("I drive a S-class, I'm rich").
"but the Tesla S is still outselling it by a wide margin"
It's outselling the S-class because the market it markets itself to is larger.
Marketing doesn't exclusively mean advertising:
The American Marketing Association has defined marketing as "the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large."[0]
Tesla has a clear marketing strategy in terms of what types of cars they sell and to what types of people. The fact that they don't pay for advertising doesn't change that. Musk/Tesla can be selective about who they do interviews with, or provide test cars to, etc. Those things are part of the marketing, even if there is no explicit purchasing of advertising.
"Tesla dont pay for advertising"
The God King doesn't need advertising when his disciples spread his words for free.
Tesla is trying to pivot towards mass market, this is well known. Whether they keep the luxury/sports line or push those into a new brand (or sub-brand) is the big question. But I don't think anyone questions whether or not the currently available Tesla cars fall into the luxury category. Both design and price suitable fall into that category.
Mercedes might have an older and long-term luxury brand that is associated with the wealthy, which is helpful, but not an absolutely critical barrier for a brand/product to be put into the luxury category.
my feeling is that parent comment wasn't claiming that tesla wasn't a luxury brand but that it was a "cool upper-class" luxury brand. Now, obviously, this is a very slippery distinction, and as someone who probably wouldn't spend that much money on a car at all, sure, it looks like a meaningless distinction... but I don't think it is, I mean, to the people who might buy the car. Tesla, clearly, is a brand for people willing to spend a lot more than the minimum on transportation, so I do think it can properly be called a 'luxury brand', but I think parent's point was that Tesla is a luxury brand that appeals to people for whom other luxury brands wouldn't appeal. I do know several people who would be vaguely embarrassed to purchase a Benz, who would seriously consider the Tesla, mostly for social reasons... and when you get down to it, social reasons dominate for cars in that price range. Hell, I might be in that group? I mean, if I came into a huge amount of money tomorrow and was looking for a luxury car... I'd probably consider the Tesla to reflect more positively socially on me than a S class or something.
Tesla is different from BMW or Mercedes just like Cadillac is different from those brands. (I mean, it has yet to be seen if Tesla will make BMW and Mercedes obsolete the way that Acura and Lexus made Cadillac obsolete. But the point being that there are big differences between the people who might buy the different luxury brands, even when the price range is similar.)
Now, i don't know that parent is correct in saying that Tesla luxury appeals to more people than Benz or BMW luxury, or Acura or Lexus luxury, but I do think that parent is correct in that the overlap between people who would buy a Benz and people who would buy a Tesla is not 100%, even though they are priced similarly.