Volkswagen's Electric Bus Went from American Flagship to Flop

wsj.com

3 pointsdylan6043 comments

It’s only a flop in the sense that Volkswagen dramatically overestimated the number of aging hippies with large amounts of disposable income.

In the year leading up to being sold in North America, VW leadership consistently said that it was going to be an expensive lifestyle vehicle. Old people with fat wallets feeling a sense of nostalgia.

It has been on sale in Europe for a few years and there have been a number a shortcomings identified. Mostly around UX and electronics. VW said they’d fix everything, but for the moment they’re going to sell everything to people who care more about how it looks than how it works. Essentially telling anyone who cares to wait until the updated version is ready (or buy something else).

This whole thing was an amazing example of incompetence. Firing factory workers can’t fix it.

When I first heard of this being offered, I was very interested. The price was a huge nope for me; much more so than the limited range. The fact that EV seems to automatically mean everything is computer is also a turn off as well. This flop should become a business school case study.

I would buy one if there was a hybrid version under $50k

Reply on news.ycombinator.com