Model 3 cars in Tesla stores BEFORE we can order our cars?

[nd4spd569]

Would be best if they build half a dozen model 3's and do a tour rather than sending one to each tesla store -- that way i can get my car a day or 2 quicker

if tesla doesn't have them available to check out prior to purchase, hopefully some early reservation holders will help out those of us who took 2 weeks to get wife approval.

You should have gone to "work" and reserved it then worked on the approval after. If she denied it you could've gotten a refund maybe without her knowing. I went with setting the bar with wanting the S and then when I told her about the 3 that was an easier sell after she heard the price difference.

 

[Red Sage]

You should have gone to "work" and reserved it then worked on the approval after. If she denied it you could've gotten a refund maybe without her knowing. I went with setting the bar with wanting the S and then when I told her about the 3 that was an easier sell after she heard the price difference.

So... What do you do after she tells all her Friends and Family members that YOU are getting HER a Tesla?

 

[flamingoezz]

you are wise beyond your years..

You should have gone to "work" and reserved it then worked on the approval after. If she denied it you could've gotten a refund maybe without her knowing. I went with setting the bar with wanting the S and then when I told her about the 3 that was an easier sell after she heard the price difference.

 

[igotzzoom]

I know the Model 3 is going to be an amazing car. Not perfect, but super-cool. I'm OK with taking delivery without test driving one first. Would be cool, sure, but not a requirement for me. Not being an S or X owner, I know I'm not going to be the very first to get one, but I did reserve on 3/31, so I hope to be driving one while they're still a relative novelty, and not as ubiquitous as a Corolla or Prius.

 

[tsla007]

Yes there will be cars at the stores before deliveries, but not for sale-only for test driving.
This will yield more sales.

 

[Garlan Garner]

Yes there will be cars at the stores before deliveries, but not for sale-only for test driving.
This will yield more sales.

I thought Tesla orders are booked out over a year and a half from now. In other words...if you order now - delivery is estimated around mid 2018. Isn't that correct?

 

[Dan Detweiler]

My understanding is that a reservation placed today probably wouldn't be delivered until late 2018.

I believe Elon stated that the first year's run was sold out. I think he tweeted this at least a month ago.

Dan

 

[Trips]

Yes there will be cars at the stores before deliveries, but not for sale-only for test driving.
This will yield more sales.

They don't need more sales they need more deliveries. I don't think they will have them in stores for a few months after the first owners get them.

99% of Tesla owners love showing their car and answering questions about them. Look at the Michigan owners that were volunteering to give test drives since Tesla legally could not.

 

[Az_Rael]

IIRC, when the X deliveries started for people that had previously not seen it, weren't they able to drive it when they picked it up and cancel if they didn't like it? Or was just a rumor? It was on the internet after all.

Even today, you don't always get to test drive the car you ordered before buying it. I never test drove my CPO until it was purchased, so the "test drive" was the drive home. It took a bit of faith when buying used, but I was very happy in the end.

 

[McRat]

The average Model 3 buyer will probably get to test drive a Model 3. Just a hunch.

Nothing sells EV's like driving one for the first time.

If Model 3's are available for test drives, Tesla will be able to get deposits from perspective buyers. These same cars will be used to allow reservation holders to experience the cars. I imagine they will be fully equipped so the RH's will upfit their orders to increase ARP.

Cliff Notes: They will make more cashflow by having loaded demo units.

 

[smak]

Tesla Model 3: Tesla is ordering enough parts for a fleet of ~300 prototypes

Won't these cars be for test drives? That should be plenty.

-smak-

 

[erthquake]

Tesla Model 3: Tesla is ordering enough parts for a fleet of ~300 prototypes

Won't these cars be for test drives? That should be plenty.

-smak-

These are all likely for testing and validation of parts only.

 

[SoloRX7]

I have never test driven any car before I bought it. But I did at least sit behind the wheel, adjust the seat, set the mirrors, check sight lines, to make sure I'd be OK with it. I strongly suspect I won't need to do even that much to get my Model ☰. But I may well do so anyway, just for the heck of it.

Is this common among Tesla and/or other EV owners? I'm not a Tesla owner (yet), and am new to the EV world.

 

[Dan Detweiler]

I didn't test drive a Volt before getting one 4 years ago. Performance wasn't a big deal to me and I had researched every feature and technical aspect of the car so I knew pretty much what I was getting. Mine was the first my dealer had delivered.

Dan

 

[skitch23]

I love test driving cars even when I'm not in the market and can't imagine buying a car without driving it first, yet I did just that with my 2013 CPO last week (barely got actual pics of it yesterday). I went back thru my email and the one and only time I've sat in Tesla was when I did my test drive in Nov 2013. IIRC it was a fully loaded P85+, so it will be substantially different than my bare bones 60.

I'm confident I will love the 3, but I'm really hoping they have some cars to test drive because I know for a fact my mom won't buy a car sight unseen.... I have a reservation in for each of us, but I think she will end up wanting me to defer her car so she can ride around in mine to make sure she really likes it before committing to it.

 

[Scannerman]

I don't think having cars early for people to test drive is that abnormal in the auto business for extremely high demand models. I purchased a 2005 Mustang GT in early 2005 when there were none in dealerships. I couldn't test drive it. The only thing I saw were pictures of it in magazines. In order to be the first I had to put my money down and order sight unseen. Honestly it isn't that far fetched to expect early adopters of a brand new high demand car to have to buy the car site unseen.

Yes it would be nice to test drive before putting your money down but that might not be that reasonable of an expectation. Let's look at it more mathematically. Say Tesla in Austin gets 2 cars. One in the showroom and one for test drives. Over 400 people were in line before opening to put in a reservation in Austin. If it is a traditional test drive where people can decide if they want something or not it isn't that far fetched for them to spend 30 minutes per test drive. So in Austin alone that would be 200 hours or 25 straight days of test drives just for the people in line. Say 1/5 of the all the reservations in the first couple days were in line vs online that means 1000 people in Austin in the first couple days of reservations. That is 500 hours of test drives for one car. That means over two solid months of trying to schedule test drives for one employee 8 hours a day/7 days a week.

I just don't think it is reasonable at this point to give test drives to all the line waiters before they have to commit to purchasing the car just from a logistics standpoint. They might figure out something where people are given blocks and given 5 or 10 minutes with the car max but would that really be enough to satisfy most people ordering?

For someone who is developing the details for a manned mission to mars, I don't think arranging for M3 test drives, would prove to be much of a challenge.

The absence of the opportunity to drive, or at least sit in and examine the M3, would very possibly be a deal breaker for me.

Scannerman

 

[ryanjm]

Plenty of good points in this thread but I'm not expecting to see cars in showrooms for a while simply because the entire first year of production is sold out. And that's before Reveal Part 3. Tesla will want/need to focus on clearing that order queue before worrying about showroom models, which will only have the net effect of adding MORE reservations that need to be filled.

 

[John E.]

We all had a decent idea of the size of the S and X....but we really dont on the 3...to me that is the biggest reason to want to see sit in one before purchasing it.

 

[JeffK]

The absence of the opportunity to drive, or at least sit in and examine the M3, would very possibly be a deal breaker for me.

You have to keep in mind that many of us don't require such an experience and therefore would be upset if our deliveries were delayed to satisfy a few people on the fence. If you don't have a reservation now then it'll be at least a year after production starts where you might even see your car. There's plenty of time after the early reservation holders get their orders where they can build a few extra for stores.

That said... if they ordered parts for 300 cars they could in theory still do the majority of crash testing and still have enough leftover cars for every gallery in the US. These would likely be partially hand built and wouldn't delay volume production and/or if the first few cars off the line are defective, they could be repaired by hand as the line gets adjusted and those models could be sent to stores instead of delivering any sub-par vehicles to customers (avoiding another Model X launch).

 

[Redmiata98]

...er, the LAST thing you want to deliver to your showrooms for test drives is a substandard defective vehicle!