"The Product Specialists (...) goal and the sole metric of their success is to have you enjoy the experience of visiting so much that you look forward to returning again."<p>This is not the experience I had. Walked into a Tesla store, said I want to test drive a Roadster. Salesman went into that profiling mode that all car salesmen do constantly and no customer likes, asking me all kinds of questions to find out how much I earn. Since my answers didn't please him, he told me I could test drive it for $300 for half a day - essentially renting it.<p>I won't be going back.
<p><pre><code> In case your eye skipped over the “for free” part, I would
like to emphasize that again – owning a Supercharger
enabled Model S really does mean free long distance travel
forever on our high speed charging network.
</code></pre>
I really wish they'd stop saying this. They're essentially committing to building a nationwide electric car charging infrastructure for $nodollars, and never charging customers to use it, ever.<p>Which means either<p><pre><code> A.) They're not going to build more than 30 charging stations.
B.) They're all going to be significantly far away from population
centers, and used only for interstate travel.
</code></pre>
No matter what, a Tesla car is going to be spending 99.9% of its time charging at home or at work.
Of course vested interests in old industries will do whatever they can to block innovation. We're seeing it with all major industry disruptions. It used to be enough for the vested interests to write laws to block out, limit, or otherwise hinder additional traditional competitors (taxi medallions, ridiculous license requirements for florists[1], etc).<p>Now we're seeing these same groups try to initiate and bring in new laws to stop competition that is truly an innovative take on an industry. Such as the Uber amendment[2] that was to be written and voted on in less than 24 hours, or cease and desist notices being sent to Lyft and SideCar, telling them to shelve their business while they investigate whether or not they are doing something illegal[3].<p>Entrenched industries with connections to governments, and governments making tax revenue from these entrenched businesses both have a huge incentive to get old laws enforced past their original intent (which were often written for the sole purpose of protecting those entrenched businesses anyway) and new laws written and passed to shut this down.<p>However, these truly innovative companies are filling a need that the old ones don't. That's why there are more Uber black cars in SF than there were black cars in traditional services before Uber[4]. These companies that are pushing society forward have so much momentum and support from the communities using them that lawmakers are better served listening to the people than ignoring them.<p>I have no doubt that Elon Musk and Tesla will be able to disrupt the car-buying market by selling direct to customers. Maybe we'll see another startup come along and piggyback off of their success by selling other cars direct, blatantly ignoring the protectionist laws, and consumers rally behind them to get the laws changed.<p>I don't know where the future lies in the auto industry, but I do know that innovation and forward progress won't be stopped in the long run, no matter how many road blocks there are. I have huge respect for all of these companies that are not only working on doing the incredibly hard task of creating and trying to sustain a company, but having to fight much larger corporations at the same time.<p>1. <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/story?id=131571&page=1" rel="nofollow">http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/story?id=131571&page=1</a><p>2. <a href="http://blog.uber.com/2012/07/09/strike-down-the-minimum-fare/" rel="nofollow">http://blog.uber.com/2012/07/09/strike-down-the-minimum-fare...</a><p>3. <a href="http://thesidecarblog.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/sidecar_cpuc_c-d.jpg" rel="nofollow">http://thesidecarblog.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/sidecar_cp...</a><p>4. From Travis Kalanick's talk at Startup School
The whole approach seems very much alike to Apple Retail stores strategy. High foot traffic locations, product specialists working not on commission, a lot of service centres - Tesla "Genius" bars. Applying proven working strategy in a different industry is a very smart move from Tesla. I see no reason why it wouldn't work.
I admire Musk and tesla. However, I see two paths for them and none are good.<p>A - fully-electric cars are still too early and will get crushed by hybrids or more efficient diesel/fossil fuel cars. Tesla becomes irrelevent.<p>B - fully-electric is all the rage, and every brand will have one. Tesla will become the victims of their own success.<p>I'm going to assume many of you are going to disagree with me. Mainly because we come from a world with a much different customer acquisition models.<p>For most people, if they had a choice they would buy a trusted car brand. Would you buy an Honda/Acura, Toyota/Lexus, Mercedes, etc with dealership in every corner or an unknown car called tesla?
Also, unlike niche companies like Ferrari/Lamborghini that have brand and performance appeal, tesla doesn't provide anything unique. For the same price point, there are far better cars, than the original lotus-based Tesla. To that point, what's their beachhead?
He certainly presents a calm and thoughtful reply to dealerships, which they will certainly ignore. I can't see how Tesla can expect to afford free supercharger stations forever though.<p>Maybe there are more failures that I'm not aware of, but generally I've noticed that full-size franchise automotive dealerships tend to last forever and are somehow tremendously profitable for their owners despite what looks like a tiny margin between "factory invoice" and what people pay for a new car.<p>These are wealthy, highly profitable legacy businesses and no doubt they're going to go out fighting any disruptors in court.<p>Next up, someone please give us the killer app that disrupts and dismantles the real estate racket and their 6% commissions...
Weren't cars advertised and sold in malls for years? This is just returning to that tradition.<p>You can clearly see the dealership in the mall in the Blues Brothers for example ("<i>The new Oldsmobiles are in early this year!</i>")
Musk says, "It is impossible for [dealers] to explain the advantages of going electric without simultaneously undermining their traditional business." But every other technology introduced, from the electric starter in the 1910s to hybrids in the 2000s, has gone through the same process. Chevrolet dealers have explained the advantages of and sold 24000 Volts in the US.
The conflict of interest argument is bogus. There's no conflict of interest between a dealer selling small cars and large cars. Or between those quipped with automatic transmissions and manual transmissions.<p>A more valid reason is that car companies should be able to sell their products anyway they like. The purpose of government is not to hand out protected status to existing merchants.<p>Of course, I can't pretend that government isn't already giving Tesla a lot of handouts.
We really need some federal legal action to make sure that Tesla is not impeded. In my opinion, aggressive action of this kind would be far more valuable than previous efforts to invest in, say, questionable solar-panel companies.