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HankLloydRight
No Roads
And with any popular car with high demand, the dealers have absolutely no qualms about inflating the sticker price to gouge the first buyers willing to put up the cash. And that can be tens of thousands of dollars over sticker price. AFAIK, the manufacturers have no control over the dealers scalping their own cars if demand is there and pushing everyone else on the waiting list down a notch. When there are no more "premium" buyers, then they start on in on the actual waiting list. Welcome to capitalism.
So would you prefer that Tesla take this path, or just look the other way when a few people try to sell their reservations?
If they are going to base the reservation order on who's in Elon Musk's Facebook Friends list, then upper mgmt, and finally hourly workers, then my money isn't going to do them any good. I'm not going to work on Sundays for Elon, or buy $5 million in bonds for an entry level car.
The "Employees First" mantra seems to have been a move to appear to be appreciative of the hard work the folk on floor have had to endure through the Model S and Model X, and now the Model 3. But? It's to reward investors? Meh.
Dislike this please. But I'm not the kind who enjoys being treated like I'm stupid. Employees First means Employees First.
I just checked my last "certificate of origin" and all information on that document is concentric to the vehicle,
vehicle i.d. #, date of manufacture, place of manufacture, essentially a birth certificate.
the state took this certificate and sales tax, inspected emissions stickers, issued temp registration,
and mailed a title to the new owner.
HankLloydRight
No Roads
Well, I did preface this particular side discussion with:
So you may be right, I don't know for sure and it could vary state-by-state. I would be surprised if there are no documents upon sale that Tesla has to complete that legally assigns/binds a buyer to the car (besides the MVPA) before titling and registration.
Of course, how many people are trying to sell their reservation is a matter of interest, but what really matters is whether anyone actually takes them up on it. And I would assume that L.A. and S.F. would be the places with the largest number, since Tesla seems to be most popular there.
I want Tesla to do just what they're doing: Prohibit the transfer of reservations, and sell the cars through their own stores rather than through independent dealers. Tesla is doing everything right.
I bought my Prius in January of 2004. At that time it was very much in demand. There were dealerships that did just what you described: Selling their first cars at enormous mark-ups; there were other dealerships that sold the car at MSRP using a first-come, first-served waiting list. I paid MSRP and took delivery two months after I ordered it. A few months later, that same dealership had quit taking orders because their waiting list was so long, but they continued to sell from the waiting list, and never charged more than MSRP. They tried pretty hard to up-sell and to push dealer options, but if you stood firm you got your car without any of that. Not all dealerships ripped off their customers.
It does not bother me if the people who made Tesla possible by providing the mountain of high-risk capital it took to get started have first crack at the car. Nor does it bother me if people who put in long hours of overtime to make this project happen get first crack at the car. All the employees are still ahead of non-employees. And further, I am grateful to the investors and employees who made this company and this car possible, and I'm grateful to all the people who will get their cars before I get mine, and who will report bugs and problems and nuisances, which will therefore be fixed before I get mine.
And I'm damn sure that friending Elon Musk on Facebook is not going to get you pushed up in the reservation line. But if it did, I wouldn't even mind that. Musk has plowed hundreds of millions of dollars of his own money into this company to make electric cars happen. Without that, Tesla would have gone under, and without it no other car companies would be making BEVs today. I'd say that Musk has more than earned the right to sell the first few thousand Model 3 cars to his pals, if that's what he wants to do. Without him we wouldn't even be having this conversation.
And I highly doubt that many of the big shots and high-powered investors even want a Model 3. They'll all be driving the P100DL Model S or Model X.
Uh, that's who Elon called out to get their car on Friday's Release. Ira Ehrenpreis is an investor. Earlier he signed over SN01 to Elon, probably so Ira could write it off as a large capital loss, but then came out with his family to 'get' a Model 3 that night. Or so it appeared. He didn't actually take delivery that night, it appeared to be choreographed since there appeared to be internet pics of the car still there Saturday.
Best I can tell Ira is a lawyer who specializes in setting up For Profit Non Profits in the Green Sector and a lobbyist to some degree? His investment landed him a seat on the board, as he has zero automotive, marketing, engineering, supply chain, CEO, CFO, managerial, media, diversity, credentials.
There was no reason to award him SN01 for the Model 3 other than paper losses. Some car companies auction off the SN01 cars for big bucks, or the Last SN on limited editions. But the money always goes to actual charities that help people in need, not investment bankers.
Good for him. But calling him a Tesla Employee when he is already employed by DBL is a bit phony.
Let's see a Line Worker with a Model 3. It's 6 weeks. There aren't that many Board Members and VPs.
Seriously??? You're in a snit because one car got delivered for show to a bigwig investor? A quick Google search suggests that over 10,000 employees have reserved one, and how many have been built so far? A few hundred? Of course most of them don't have theirs yet.
Nobody invests millions of dollars in order to be first to get the Corolla of BEVs. They invest because they believe in the company and/or its goals. I've got no problem with rewarding that kind of support with Car #1. Remember, if it weren't for the people willing to risk BIG bucks investing in this company, NOBODY would be getting this car.
Would you even want Car #1? The car that will have EVERY bug and flaw that managed to slip through R&D and testing? I actually think I did the right thing waiting until Day 2 to make my reservation. They'll be on the road in large enough numbers to have real-life data and reviews available before I have to make my final decision.
SageBrush
REJECT Fascism
Someone once said the employees would get the cars first.
I do not believe anybody who actually builds Teslas has one yet. Prove me wrong.
There is nothing wrong with giving out the cars to investors before the workers. It just is not a good PR move. Many of us expected to see 30 happy new employee owners pick up cars that night. They will actually drive them, not park them in their harem.
This has zero effect on me personally. The M3 arrives when it arrives, that has not changed.
It does affect public perception, and perhaps not in a good way.
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Did Tesla ever say that assembly-line workers would be the very first to get the cars? Or did they actually say that owners would get priority over non-owners and employees would get priority over owners? I think it was the latter.
Again, this is a tempest in a teapot. We're talking about the first few cars out of the factory, before they've even begun full-bore production. Founders get the first cars, if they want them. Really big investors next, though both those categories are not likely to even want a Model 3, since they're already driving Model S and Model X, so why would they take such a big step down?
My Roadster is a much better car than Elon's Roadster because they had a couple of years to improve on it between building his and building mine. I would not have wanted Roadster #1. And I don't want Model 3 #001.
Again, you're making a colossal fuss over what are practically Beta-test cars, very low volume, first month's production.
I don't believe Tesla has missed the promised delivery date for a single employee's Model 3.
And you are moving the goalposts when you insist that "employee" has to mean "line worker." Tesla never said that assembly-line workers would get priority over other employees. But the fact is that we don't know who has gotten a Model 3 yet. That information does not seem to be public. So demanding that I "prove you wrong" about who has gotten the cars is just a silly attempt to divert attention away from the fact that you've made an unsupported and unsupportable claim. You can no more prove that no line worker has gotten a Model 3 than I can prove that any of them have.
And then there's Jason Calcanis, Silicone Valley Angel investor: "Calacanis was one of the first people to take delivery of a Model 3 and the first Model S owner (Signature Series 001). He also owns the 16th Tesla Roadster produced and another Model S, making it a four-Tesla family. "
And, interestingly enough, Calcanis comments on selling a Model 3 reservation:
"Calacanis also had some strong advice for Tesla short sellers in one of his tweets, stating “if you’re short $tsla/a bear you are going to jump off a bridge when reviews come in for Model 3. Early reservation slots will sell for $10k.”
I don't think he necessarily meant to approve of selling reservations as his point simply seems to be that the Model 3 is a great car. You can read the whole article here:
Silicon Valley angel calls Tesla Model 3 greatest tech product ever created
HankLloydRight
No Roads
It wasn't a false choice. It was a rhetorical question to ponder the differences.
ACA Man
Member
SageBrush
REJECT Fascism
uh huh
Then how come I prefer the choice you did not offer, that Tesla sell direct and not allow reservation transfers ?
HankLloydRight
No Roads
As I said, it was a rhetorical question for the reader to ponder the differences in other, potential, realities. It was not an exhaustive list of options from which to choose one.
See: Rhetorical question - Wikipedia
In the linked article he says:
That smacks of hyperbole to me. Whatever the Model 3 is, the Model S is better, except for those of us who prefer a smaller car. The Model S is bigger, quicker, and has far more tech and options.
And I repeat that I don't think those ads asking $10K for an early reservation will get many takers. But of course, as an investor I can forgive him a bit of hyperbole and over-enthusiasm. He has a lot riding on the success of the car.
This is objectively false. The Model 3 has substantially more interior storage, has a separate trunk (important to some people), and several other (admittedly minor) improvements that the Model S does not as yet have.
You really feel that, except for those of us who prefer a smaller car, the Model S is objectively inferior to the Model 3? I find that difficult to believe. The Model 3 will be bought by people who want a smaller car than the Model S, or who want a less expensive car than the Model S. Those are its two advantages. Smaller and less expensive.
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