Tesla – Page 2425 – I wish I had more to offer

Toyota’s luxury Lexus brand plans battery EV launch in 2020

FILE PHOTO: Toyota Motor Corp’s Lexus brand logo is displayed at the 44th Tokyo Motor Show in Tokyo, Japan, November 2, 2015. REUTERS/Issei Kato TOKYO (Reuters) – Toyota Motor’s (7203.T) Lexus will launch its first all-battery electric vehicle next year, as the luxury brand races to market a battery-operated car amid growing competition to develop… Continue reading Toyota’s luxury Lexus brand plans battery EV launch in 2020

To go big on EVs, Japanese car makers think super-small

TOKYO (Reuters) – As global automakers race to put long-range electric vehicles on highways amid stricter emission laws, Japanese rivals are taking a niche approach and steering towards cheaper, pint-sized runabouts to make costly battery technology more accessible. FILE PHOTO: Toyota Motor’s logo is pictured at the 45th Tokyo Motor Show in Tokyo, Japan October… Continue reading To go big on EVs, Japanese car makers think super-small

Zoox cofounder Jesse Levinson says there’s ‘no chance’ Tesla will launch fully self-driving cars next year, despite Elon Musk’s claims

When asked if there’s “any chance” that Tesla will have fully self-driving cars ready next year as Tesla CEO Elon Musk has claimed, Zoox cofounder and CTO Jesse Levinson had a one-word answer: “No.” Speaking with transportation reporter Mark Matousek on stage at Business Insider’s IGNITION: Transportation event in San Francisco Tuesday, Levinson said that… Continue reading Zoox cofounder Jesse Levinson says there’s ‘no chance’ Tesla will launch fully self-driving cars next year, despite Elon Musk’s claims

Both Tesla And CATL Are Considering ‘Cell-To-Pack’ Manufacturing

Is this the wave of the future? Until now, battery-pack production has followed the same basic procedure. A company that specializes in making battery cells like Panasonic or LG Chem makes the individual cells and then the automakers take those cells and package them into a battery pack. In other words, the cell production is… Continue reading Both Tesla And CATL Are Considering ‘Cell-To-Pack’ Manufacturing

Elon Musk: Tesla Solar and Powerwall could increase your home value

Tesla CEO Elon Musk tentatively said that adding solar and Powerwall to your home could increase your home value and he is probably right. Over the last few months, Tesla has been trying to revamp its solar business. More recently, Tesla launched a new solar rental service under which homeowners can get a solar panel system… Continue reading Elon Musk: Tesla Solar and Powerwall could increase your home value

Ford generates headlines with proactive EV charging strategy

Ford is currently selling only one plug-in vehicle, the Fusion Plug-in Hybrid (formerly the Fusion Energi). The company’s Focus Electric and C-MAX Energi seem to have been swept away in the recent sedan massacre. However, the company is planning to introduce a “Mustang-inspired electric crossover” in 2020, and is working on an electric pickup truck.… Continue reading Ford generates headlines with proactive EV charging strategy

Tesla takes you behind the scenes at its crash-test lab

Tesla has earned a strong reputation for occupant safety. And in a video posted Tuesday by Tesla, the California carmaker shows that, as with every other automaker, there's physical testing and probably a degree of trial and error involved.

The brief look at its in-house crash-testing regimen covered computer simulations all the way through to the crushing of real-life metal and the analysis that inevitably follows. And it shows both the computer-simulated crash testing procedure along with providing an up-close look at Tesla's physical crash-testing facility and the systems behind it.

The company keeps it electric in the lab, too; two Model S Performance drive units to propel its test models into crash barriers.

The video shows Teslas undergoing both front- and rear-end crash tests, and we also get to see a crashed model on a rotisserie for post-collision evaluation.

Tesla has been criticized on multiple occasions for overstating the crashworthiness of its cars. The company was accused of misusing methodology from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to assert that the Model 3 was the safest car the federal agency had ever tested.

Tesla Model 3 crash

NHTSA issued a statement in response, saying: “A 5-star rating is the highest safety rating a vehicle can achieve. NHTSA does not distinguish safety performance beyond that rating, thus there is no 'safest' vehicle among those vehicles achieving 5-star ratings.”

In September, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety awarded the Model 3 a Top Safety Pick+ rating, which is the highest rating it can bestow on a 2019- or 2020-model-year vehicle. It joins the Audi E-tron in achieving that honor.

Elon Musk, who claims he’s low on cash, recently sold his LA mansion for nearly $4 million — and that was just one of several properties he owns in the area. Take a look inside his real-estate portfolio.

Filings by the lawyer for the plaintiff in a recent defamation lawsuit against Elon Musk say Musk testified that he’s “financially illiquid,” despite the Tesla CEO’s multi-billionaire status, Business Insider’s Mark Matousek reported. Incidentally, Business Insider’s Graham Rapier previously reported that Musk sold a home he owned in late August — and that was just… Continue reading Elon Musk, who claims he’s low on cash, recently sold his LA mansion for nearly $4 million — and that was just one of several properties he owns in the area. Take a look inside his real-estate portfolio.

Volvo to pay battery charges in bid to help sell electric SUVs

Gabrielle Coppola, Bloomberg Published 12:01 a.m. ET Oct. 21, 2019 Volvo Cars isn’t just electrifying its lineup to cut carbon emissions. Now the Swedish automaker says it will pay customers to make sure they plug in. Volvo is tying the launch of its first all-electric vehicle – the XC40 Recharge crossover – to a broader… Continue reading Volvo to pay battery charges in bid to help sell electric SUVs

Tesla Drops Deposit Fee To $100

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Published on October 18th, 2019 |

by Johnna Crider

Tesla Drops Deposit Fee To $100

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October 18th, 2019 by Johnna Crider

Tesla has dropped its deposit fee from $2,500 to $100. Also important to note, the previous $1,000 and $2,500 deposit fees were fully refundable, but the $100 deposit is nonrefundable.

CNBC says that, “The order fee means that Tesla will make money every time a person places an order, even if they decide not to move forward with their purchase — no matter why they decided to bail.” (Yes, that is the definition of a nonrefundable fee.)

To be honest, I don’t think this is a bad thing at all. Let’s look at it from the point of view of a business. A business is meant to do one major thing: thrive. In order for it to thrive, it must survive. For this to happen, the business needs money to build itself up, create products to sell, sell them, and so on. Fully refundable deposits can send incorrect signals, create false expectations, and complicate Tesla’s operations. A nonrefundable deposit (which is what Tesla used to use), even if much smaller (it was previously much higher), is an actual commitment. Not that many people are going to give away $100, so they also won’t place an order without a genuine commitment or plan to buy the product.

Let me explain it in another way. I will use myself as an example. I am a “wire artist,” someone who makes jewelry with wire, be it copper, silver, or gold. These metals can get quite costly, especially gold. Then add in the cost of the mineral or gemstone — you won’t be looking at the sales numbers Tesla sees, but depending on what someone orders, it could be a $400 piece of jewelry that is handmade.

$400 is a lot for artists like me, and at least 25% of that will be the base cost — cost of the materials alone. Then there’s the work that goes into making the piece and shipping it. With Tesla, it has to pay employees.

So, when a customer places an order and then changes their mind, a business needs to have a plan in action. Personally, I charge full price upfront for my work and inform my customers that it’s non-refundable due to the cost of materials.

Now, let’s look at it again from the point of view of Tesla. The company has thousands of customers a week. Let’s imagine that out of every 1,000 orders, 10 are canceled. I am not sure what the exact number is, so I’m just guesstimating here. So, if 10 per 1,000 are cancelled and these 10 paid $2,500, then that could equate to $25,000 in cash Tesla would lose just from having to return deposits. [Editor’s note: With my new Tesla referral code, I have seen 8 people finalize a Tesla order and 3 place an order and then cancel it. Another 7 have placed an order and are yet to receive the car (and thus finalize the order) or cancel. That’s certainly not a scientific sample, but just as one data point, that’s a 27% cancel rate. If that’s anywhere near the norm, it must be quite a challenge for Tesla to manage when it so closely matches production with consumer demand.]

The best way to prevent those kinds of losses is to make it nonrefundable, and to do that, Tesla had to lower it. Remember, Tesla has to thrive–not just survive–but to thrive. The goal of anyone with a business is to prosper, yet people have this mentality that Tesla (and other businesses) must be bad because they make a lot of money. Some seem to give little to no thought about this. I see people all the time asking for Elon to give them a Tesla. If he did, Tesla wouldn’t make money.

On the plus side for customers, making the deposit only $100 makes it easier to get through the first step of buying a Tesla. $100 is still a lot to the average American working 2–3 part-time jobs and holding down a side business to survive — but it’s a lot more approachable than $2,500!

Photo by JRR, CleanTechnica

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About the Author

Johnna Crider Johnna Crider is a Baton Rouge artist, gem and mineral collector, and Tesla shareholder who believes in Elon Musk and Tesla. Elon Musk advised her in 2018 to “Believe in Good.”

Tesla is one of many good things to believe in. You can find Johnna on Twitter

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