Audi Tells Dealers To Get On The Electric Bandwagon Because They Are Coming

At this point, most industry watchers would agree that car dealers are a barrier to the electrification of the car industry. Recent studies have painted a negative (borderline disastrous) picture of the electric vehicle shopping experience. Car dealers’ lack of interest in selling EVs have led to poor knowledge about the vehicles, no inventories, cars often being left uncharged and not ready for test drives.

Knowing car dealers make most of their money from service and that EVs have fewer moving parts and therefore require less service, Tesla anticipated the issue and decided to operate its own sales force. But other automakers are stuck with their dealership networks and they are now trying to get them on-board with EVs in order to be competitive in the ongoing electrification of the industry.

w222 - 1/31/2017 4:01:55 PM

+5 Boost

only a blind person doesn't see that

SanJoseDriver - 1/31/2017 10:00:43 PM

+2 Boost

10 years... by that time an EV powertrain will cost less on day 1 than an equivalent ICE. That is not factoring in less costs to fuel, maintain, or service the car after day 1. Manufacturers would be shooting themselves in the foot to not get on board.

(Tesla is supposedly 5 years out on hitting cost parity with an equivalent ICE... the magic number is around $100 per KWh for batteries).

SanJoseDriver - 2/1/2017 9:06:33 PM

+1 Boost

You might be confusing electric vehicles with self-driving vehicles. There will be many EVs where self-driving will not even be an option (like today's Bolt or Leaf). But self-driving is coming soon as well. Not sure how that means the government will tell you where to go or how better, safer cars at a lower cost is a bad idea.

SanJoseDriver - 2/7/2017 9:12:07 PM

+1 Boost

That sounds extremely paranoid--hopefully you're wrong but with Trump as president the US already feels like a Black Mirror episode.

Theoretically you could say the exact same thing with gasoline. The government can track when/where you fill up with gas using cameras even if you pay with cash.

Also, the 95% use case for EVs is that you fill up at home, not at a charging station. Now that we are starting to get "affordable" EVs with 200+ miles of range and luxury EVs approaching 400 miles, most people will never use a station (I have used a charging station twice in the past 3.5 years of EV ownership and that is with only 140 miles of range and a long commute).

If you are super paranoid, EVs can also plug into any normal outlet, which will not have any sort of tracking whatsoever.