While I'd normally assume this is just review samples, 125K is far too many for that.
The 125k is the capacity of the line. The industry always exaggerates these figures and Tesla is no different. For example, I've heard estimates that NUMMI had a capacity of >650k units. Under Toyota/GM it never did more than ~450k.
Initial deliveries will be very slow. Though by January, they will likely be producing them much more quickly than Ford was producing Lightnings in Q3. :rofl
Maybe.
This just shows the massive value of Tesla as a brand. The price doesn't even matter, the product just sells.
The truck will be a new market, particularly in the US where trucks are so prevalent. This may be where their growth comes from – trucks rather than the Tesla brand. However they may be limiting themselves with such an... eccentric? approach and design.
I think it is that they've saturated the market. Y is literally on the brink of being the highest selling vehicle in the world and has a good chance of ending the year as the highest selling car in the US.
They are squeezing ~1.7M units out of two models. It isn't hard to see why they've had to be aggressive on pricing to hit such crazy volume targets. For comparison, BMW does ~2.5M (including Mini) with well over 12 models.
CT is going to be an interesting case. On the one hand, I think it is a fad product. I can't see a design like that holding a sustainable and large place in the market.
OTOH, it is one of the few products that can avoid the "invisible car" effect. I routinely run into people who "never see electric cars". The CT is impossible to miss.
Within 12 months of it being on the market, people will think it dominates the market for electric trucks, even if that isn't true.
The most popular vehicle in the US? The F150 [1]. You must dive into this market segment head on, as this vehicle population is responsible for substantial US mobility emissions [2]. Sell to younger people who want trucks, but want an electric truck. Same reason Harley Davidson spun their Livewire bike out to its own brand [3]: old people riding Harley's didn't want it, and that persona is dying out. So you have to create a new brand to cater to the persona you're targeting [4] [5].
[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2021/12/02/ford-pickup-remains-americas...
[2] https://record.umich.edu/articles/study-compares-greenhouse-...
[3] https://www.cnbc.com/2022/09/27/harley-davidson-spins-off-li...
[4] https://medium.com/startup-grind/people-dont-buy-products-th...
Toyota tried to do that with Scion, it turned out to be a bad business move.
Toyota had a brand-relationship with the idea of quality and value, whereas most people related Scion to the Korean groups Kia and Hyundai, which at the time only had very low-quality offerings in the United States.
People didn't realize they were just rebranded Toyota. The resale suffered greatly compared to the mother company and after the gimmick of pseudo-Kei cars floundered in the west entirely they decided to just re-merge all of the vehicles back under the Toyota marque.
My point being : certain sacrifices are made when a "hep to younger generations' rebrand occurs. For Toyota it was their brand awareness w.r.t. quality and value, and Scion couldn't hold its' own weight with just gimmicky offerings.
I have my doubts about how successful electric trucks are going to be in the short term. The US is in the grips of an intense culture war and eco-anything is part of it. Hell, there are truck owners here that deliberately make their trucks less environmentally friendly just to "own the libs".
Truck enthusiasts despise electric vehicles and environmentalists recognize that no amount of marketing will make an 8,000 pound truck "green".
The cybertruck aesthetic is way too "look at me" for me to actually want one, but I'll enjoy seeing them driving around. I have a colleague who seems somewhat serious about getting one, and I'll be happy to ride in it at least.
The rest of the world would disagree on this. Many countries have the same necessities as the US, and yet trucks are an almost uniquely American concept (same may be true of Canada, I'm not familiar enough). To put it another way, I think the American baseline for "enthusiast" is far higher than elsewhere.
I think it's a combination of: living far apart, multi-car households, high availability of car financing and the deep cultural desire for self-sufficiency. Most countries differ on one or more of these, and there may be other factors here.
The biggest driver behind price decreases this year has to be the super high interest rates on car loans, making financing expensive for consumers. Given that, 17.8% margins isn't too bad.
Which is crazy, considering that 3 and Y are pretty close to their prices from back then.