For some perspective, the Model 3 is already outselling the Chevy Bolt by a factor of > 5x, and has already set the record for greatest monthly deliveries EVER for a plug-in car in the U.S.
I'm sure it's a difficult problem and I'm rooting for them to figure it out but until they start to produce more cars, there's going to be people asking questions.
Obviously people have strong feelings about Tesla one way or the other, as it's obviously a pillar for the high-risk-high-reward ethos that gets people excited, but the future of Tesla is incredibly uncertain at the moment. Elon Musk is likely to be fired from his own company, they have to pay over a billion dollars in loans next year, their cash flow is a mess, and there is no telling when they will actually be GAAP profitable. I don't own TSLA stock nor do I have any short/put positions - but TSLA is almost as volatile as some cryptocurrencies.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-11/apple-is-...
With that in mind, the dialogue about Jobs / Musk feels oddly familiar with institutional investors having major issues and everyone else probably being too optimistic.
It's usefulness is when you want to raise capital by floating shares; but Elon will just do that a lower price by diluting ownership more.
For one car company to have such a large share of a car market monthly sales is pretty impressive. Plus that list includes hybrids.
If you only include full electric Tesla has 9220 / 13074 ~ 70% of the monthly sales.
Tesla is popular, for sure, but hard to produce at scale.
Video of a guy transforming an Aztek into a reasonably attractive sports car. Pretty impressive!
I am one of these people. I live in the Pacific Northwest, where it rains 7-8 months out of the year. A nice car will be totally ruined in a few weeks of rain around here. So everyone just drives ugly Honda Accords and AWD Subarus.
Related side note, a teacher back when I was in HS about 10 years ago told a story about how she saw Bill Gates driving a beat up mid 1990s Accura around Seattle after he was crowned the world's wealthiest individual.
What are you talking about? PNW rain isn’t going to hurt your car unless you leave the sunroof open.
Tons of people in Seattle drive late model luxury cars.
It's still badly broken in the looks department if you ask me.
But I don't think I'd have to try really hard to convince the wife to get a Bolt. It sure as hell is better looking than anything else we own. And despite owning way more TSLA than is healthy for our portfolio, I'm not terribly impressed by the looks of the 3. It's not ugly, but it doesn't stand out, either.
The front of the Tesla 3 keeps reminding me of this guy. (You see, when I look at the front of a car, there's supposed to be something there, but there's something less than what I expected.)
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/6e/Hannibal_Lect...
Someone should make a luggage rack for the Scion xB that looks like a handle from one of those old-school lunchboxes.
Nevertheless I do agree. I get really frustrated at how people are willing to accept cars that are so ugly.
The Bolt is better than others, but I personally think it's still a really ugly car. It's a complement to say that it's only as ugly as most regular cars are, but still it's ugly.
I'm impressed by the new leaf, it actually looks like a nice car. But the front of the first leaf looked ridiculous.
Tesla somehow figured out that people who want to buy electric cars, like cars that look nice too. It's the most obvious piece of advice, yet no car company could think of it.
Nice looking cars add something to the road scenery, bring pleasure to those who pass by them.
What I'm most impressed about is that Tesla have done what almost no luxury sports car brand has done and try and sell a mass market car and keep the nice looks of the brand. I'd liken the Model S/X to more like a Porsche/Aston Martin than a BMW. It's actually a bit simialr to the Porsche Boxter but that only makes up 10-20% of sales [0].
Personally the major attraction for me is that for $35k (when it comes in 2035...) you can get a car that has similar styling to a luxury sports car.
Making nice looking cars is worthwhile. The new Mini achieved it, the Fiat 500 managed it. Beauty is something to be cherished, and when you're going to make a million of the things and you only have to design it once, why not make it beautiful.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porsche#North_American_sales
Can I just have a regular car that works on electricity please? Spare me the tacky from-the-future look please.
You quote the new Mini and 500 as nice looking. To me they are bland and unadventurous, and the Mini looks ridiculously bloated. I'd walk past them in a carpark to look at an Aztec.
Compare a 500 with a Panda on the same platform. The latter has much more internal volume and looks just as ... bland.
It's the same guy, Dante Giacosa, who designed the Multipla and the 500.
I too dislike bland cars, but almost any mass market car is going to be bland. By mass market I mean anything under $/€20k and designed to appeal to the mass market. At least though with bland cars they just fade into the background and you can ignore them.
It truly is. It's easily the fugliest car GM has ever produced, and this is from someone who owns and loves a Nissan Leaf. Whatever their next-gen purpose built EV may be, I hope to god it's not the same platform.
The Bolt just looks like some generic little hatchback that’s trying a little too hard to look cool.