Slashdot Mirror
Dealership Commentator: Tesla's Going To Win In Every State
cartechboy writes Unless you've been in a coma for a while you're aware that many dealer associations have been causing headaches for Tesla in multiple states. The reason? They are scared. Tesla's new, different, and shaking up the ridiculously old way of doing things. But the thing is, Tesla keeps winning. Now Ward's commenter Jim Ziegler, president of Ziegler Supersystems in Atlanta, wrote an opinion piece that basically says Tesla's going to prevail in every state against dealer lawsuits. He says Tesla's basically busy defending what are nuisance suits. This leads to the question of whether there will be some sort of sweeping federal action in Tesla's favor.
Not unless Tesla can outspend the dealers lobby.
As this is an interstate sale, federal action is actually constitutional. However, I don't see any reason we need Washington to command us how to sell cars; Tesla's approach (common sense and a bajillion dollars) seems to be working.
Not unless Tesla can outspend the dealers lobby.
They do have a considerable budget to work with. Here's to hoping!
I buy damn near everything over the internet. I get exactly what I want from a competitive marketplace. Why can't I buy a car to my exact specifications direct from the manufacturer? If Amazon can deliver almost anything to my front door, why can't GM, Ford and Toyota deliver a car to my door?
Not sure why these dealers are so scared. Tesla is a super high end product that only gets 200 or so miles to a charge. The appeal to even fairly well of people is limited. The existing car companies are still going to be prevented from selling directly.
This leads to the question of whether there will be some sort of sweeping federal action in Tesla's favor.
I'd say that's a poor choice of wording. If any such action was taken, it would be AGAINST dealers. It won't be in favour of any single company. It should be fair for all.
Those who do not learn from commit history are doomed to regress it.
One thing is that in most states the laws were written to protect franchises against the car manufacturers but in this case there are no franchises to protect to often these laws don't apply.
This podcast gives a lot of insight as to why the dealerships are so anti-consumer blood sucking parasites.
http://www.thisamericanlife.or...
One other thing to keep in mind is that the dealership model has changed significantly. It used to be a bunch of mom and pop dealerships throughout the country. These aren't the dealerships complaining about Tesla. Instead it's the huge dealership conglomerates that have gobbled up and consolidated many of the smaller independent dealerships. These are also huge political donors in many states, getting laws written to protect them, often to the detriment of the automobile manufacturers.
Part of it is the way the car manufacturers have the dealerships competing against each other, giving them huge incentives to sell a certain number of cars by the end of the month, etc. The dealerships also make a lot of their money off of service, whether it be warranty service or just plain service.
Tesla does things differently. The people who work at the showrooms do not earn commissions on cars sold. Their job is to show the car, not play all these silly games pushing cars that people don't want to get their numbers.
Also, Tesla generally does not maintain an inventory of cars. Every car is built to order with only the features the buyer wants. They don't have huge lots of cars that they have to push since every car is already spoken for.
Their service is also different. They have publically stated that their goal is not to make a profit off of service. I have had to have things repaired that were not covered by warranty (I broke some clips). The cost to repair was actually fairly reasonable and was much less than what the cost would have been had the same sort of thing happened to my Prius.
My biggest complaint about service is that there is often a long wait to get an appointment because they're having trouble keeping up with the growing number of cars out there.
Tesla took a cue from Apple with the Apple stores. They want to provide a consistent experience for their customers without all of the hassles and problems often encountered at dealerships. The company has also consistently bent over backwards in favor of their customers. When news of the fires hit they quickly extended the battery warranty to cover fires caused by hitting objects then actively worked on methods to mitigate it. They retroactively increased the drive train warranty to unlimited miles.
This post is encrypted twice with ROT-13. Documenting or attempting to crack this encryption is illegal.
If a car maker would sell regular cars the way Tesla does, why couldn't they compete in a major way and dominate the younger generation demographic?
I suppose the barrier here is all the big auto makers are so set in their ways with and entrenched in regulatory capture that there is no incentive for them to change to a new "model".
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
Few things cheese me off more than corporate cartels and their allies in congress who preach about the goodness of the free market and against government meddling, right up until the free market threatens their dominant position; then they want the government to put a stop to that nonsense immediately. If you really do support a free market, then you either change with the times or you get out of the way and stop holding back those who are actually innovating.
Huh? What's your point? Are you being sarcastic?
It always surprises me that states that argue the most for anti-government involvement in business affairs (the Red or Conservative states) are the first to decry a company that is espousing their ideals. There's too much money involved with Cars and Constituents and other things that our 'elected leaders' care about.
Tesla's model is, as far as I understand, direct and open competition with their fellow automobile salespeople/dealerships. Tesla is doing everything right (that we know) and should be allowed to do direct business with consumers of their products.
In the US, its hard because we have a hard time seeing the 'middleman' in our transactions, whether it be at the shopping mall buying clothes or at teh convenience store buying a squishee. Conservatives are mostly arguling against something they believe in, or at least at face value. If they truly want free business unregulated by law, they should allow Tesla to continue to operate as it is.
Unfortunately the politcal situation in the United States is laughable at best. The outcome is likely to be that many states (a few have already) ban Tesla from selling cars in their state. Sad Day.
Anyone wanna have a drink? We're fucked.
Citation needed.
I've learned that they're worthless, so I don't read AC comments anymore.
I highly recommend to everyone reading this discussion to listen to this 16-minute NPR Money Matters story:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/money...
Them if you have some time, This American Life tells the dealer's side of the story:
http://m.thisamericanlife.org/...
I'll warm you now that your blood may boil, and you may turn into a rage monster thinking about the sheer absurdity and stupidity of the car-buying process.
I'm sorry, but your opinion seems to be wrong.
Citation coming up.
Of course, the AC is wrong in most respects.
1. They're not selling 'carbon credits', they're selling ZEV credits(Zero Emissions Vehicle).
2. The price isn't $30k per car, the penalty itself is only $5k per missed ZEV, so logically Tesla has to sell them for less. Maybe $4k each.
It's not small change, but it's only about 5% of the vehicle.
I don't read AC A human right
citation needed
I hope every one of the grubby mofo's goes out of business and that all vehicle manufacturers follow Tesla's lead in this matter.
In my neck of the woods (Germany) that would have counted as criminal fraud and the German equivalent of the DA might have been interested. :-)
I'm not so sure about US law, but threatening legal action might have been just the right thing
C - the footgun of programming languages
So why doesn't he just say that instead of the verbal diarrhea ?
Try again:
"Tesla is new, different, and shaking up the ridiculously old way of doing things."
"... basically says Tesla is going to prevail in every state against ..."
Turn into a rage monster?
This wouldn't happen to be a giant green rage monster would it?
If so, SIGN ME UP!
The states have been regulating comercial car sales new and used for a long time now.
Regulation does not require the use of a mandatory middle man. Particularly one that adds as little value as most dealers do. The reasons we have the dealer system we do are largely historical and anachronistic. Regulations can come in many form and pretty much all (legal) transactions are regulated to some degree (see the Uniform Commercial Code). I have no problem with states requiring manufacturers to play nice with their dealers but I have a HUGE problem with states requiring me to buy a car through a dealer even when it makes zero economic sense for me to do so.
I do not see why anyone should be able to skirt that.
First off, just because something is the law doesn't make it right. There are plenty of unjust, cruel or even just stupid laws out there that deserve to be ignored.
Obsolete laws and business models deserve to go the way of the dodo. Furthermore it isn't obvious that Tesla is skirting any law and even if they were I REALLY do not care in this case. Independent car dealers provide me not a single service I genuinely need. They have a very well deserved reputation for behavior that borders on criminal. I would much rather deal with Ford or Toyota or BMW directly than most any independent dealer.
They never anticipated a new manufacturer showing up who didn't want to sell through dealers.
I disagree. I think they (meaning the dealers) understood this possibility perfectly which explains some of the current fighting. They just never had to worry about it much because starting a successful new car company is damn near impossible. Plenty have tried but it takes very deep pockets to get into that business, particularly in mature markets like the US. Tesla is really the first company to try.
Actually yes. In area, is there a competing phone company? Do they have dealers? And so....
What is good for Verizon, AT&T, etc -- no dealerships, must also be true and allowed for Tesla
Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada
$30K is a long long way from $4k. To say "If they didn't have that, they wouldn't be making any money" about $4k per car is ridiculous. Thank you for pointing out that the AC was full of shit.
I've learned that they're worthless, so I don't read AC comments anymore.
Not only you're wrong in the amount, but also you ignore the FACT that every company making ZEVs can sell those credits if they make only ZEVs.
And the credit is per ZEV, not a percentage of the ZEV price.
So Tesla is the company least benefited from the ZEV credit. Nissan making cheap ZEV gets a much better return on their investment.
And that takes us to the most important FACT about Tesla.
Tesla is a for profit company, but as far as for profit companies go, Tesla cares a whole lot about customer satisfaction than average.
But it probably doesn't matter, for me "Anonymous Coward" = paid anti Tesla shill in this case. If you had any balls you would show yourself up.