Poll: What is most important to you in owning (or wanting to own) a Tesla?

[jkirkwood001]

My biggest one is not on there which is: Never having to go to a gas station again. I never have to wait to get gas. Never have that light come on that I -- again need to go there. Never have to get bothered by increasing gas prices. Never hold that handle to put gas in which many people touched before me. Every morning I wake up and have more than 400 km to my disposal.

Another one is the silence and the fact that you never feel or hear the engine working when going uphill.

Oh yes, another one is that you enter into a nice and warm car due to the preconditioning. That was so nice during the cold winter months.

Oh I like that one about silence, @Dutchie! Reminds me when I first heard a DDD CD-ROM play after years of LP records. Revolutionary. I'm still waiting for my first EV experience (have rented Prius' but not without an ICE). Sorry I can't seem to add more than 12 choices. You can pick "Other", and if we get a lot of those, then we have the wrong selection. Right now, "Other" is 6%.

 

[Tiger]

Good point, @Sandiegodoug. I should have also added "e.g." to performance - it's not just about speed. I can't edit the existing choices.

I also would like to add AWD, since there have been hardly any AWD EVs before Tesla and I need AWD for weekly driving steep hills in winter here. But it seems like 12 choices is the max, and I can't edit the existing ones. Still, I think this selection is pretty comprehensive.

This is incorrect. Range and Performance are separate issues. It's ok that superchargers are not included as it is not a worldwide phenomenon. I wouldn't buy a Tesla with 100mle range and superchargers within that distance. I wouldn't buy a Tesla with 300mle range without superchargers, but I would buy a 400mle+ Tesla without superchargers. But I wouldn't buy it without performance or safety.

 

[Monops]

For me it's that I can charge it at home

 

[Goatdan]

1) I would put lack of regular maintenance / cost reduction together and call it monetary planning ability. Put these two together because the time the maintenance saves and the ability to have a pretty solid idea that it will be about $XX a month in electric is so much easier to plan for than an unknown amount of money for gas and maintenance regularly popping up.

2) Range / superchargers. We already found the above to be true with a Nissan Leaf we bought used and love. We still have to use my gas car about six times a year for trips beyond our usual range. Once a year, it would be beyond the long range range, so we need a reliable fast charging network. If we do that, we can get the cost certainty of 1 in a car we need.

And yes, theoretically I could rent the six times a year I need a longer range car, but that takes time I don't want to spend and I would still need to replace a car here with something else.

Beyond those two things, nothing else is *the* reason I want one. I love their acceleration, I love the tech, I love the sound or lack thereof. But the combination of saving time, making money spent more predictable and ability to go where ever are far and away the best reasons.

 

[insaneoctane]

Folks who answered "not having to pump gas" or similar could simply buy a Chevy Bolt and save money and get their car now

 

[Jack6591]

Instilling in my grandchildren the idea that they can change the world.

 

[Big Dog]

none of the above. I'm buying to the simplicity of an electric motor in a car that is not ugly. (Here's looking at you BMW, and Prius. If BMW woulda dropped an electric motor in its 3-series, it woulda sold like hotcake.)

 

[ℬête Noire]

Folks who answered "not having to pump gas" or similar could simply buy a Chevy Bolt and save money and get their car now

I also did this....but:
1) Realistically need 2 vehicles.
2) The Bolt don't get Daddy further than 90-ish miles from home before he's got to turn around. Realistically that ain't much around these parts.

I'm down to only 2 gas station visits so far this year, and one of those was only a bathroom break for a kid. Parked out front at the curb with the Bolt....resisted the urge to reverse-ICE a gas pump.

The wife has had to fill our ICE a few times so far. This is down from her normally filling close to 3 times every 2 weeks while I was about twice or thrice times/month. A lot of improvement there, so I guess that's part of why that didn't make the top 3.

Really there's a lot of that list that counts as a factor to this decision. Including a variation on "Cult of Elon", even if it's more about being on board with a Mars push happening. Really that's sort of what's behind the "industry reboot", too, as that's part of what Mars colonizing needs. Clearly Tesla isn't there, in a lot of ways it's not even up to existing industry. It's about where they're aiming.

 

[jkirkwood001]

Instilling in my grandchildren the idea that they can change the world.

My son and his wife are existing twins in June! This wasn't on my list, but now... wonderful.

 

[devilmountain]

• To stop buying oil from the Middle East.
  
• Performance, I considered buying a Volt or Fusion Energi to reduce my gas usage. However, I don't think I could stand driving a standard four-cylinder motor. I have always driven 6 or 8 Cylinders until my current car. I purchased a four-cylinder and it moves good, but I miss the power of a larger motor.
  
• Styling, It doesn't look like a Bolt, Leaf, or Prius, The M3 looks nice.
• EAP

The goal is to turn the M3 into my family's primary car.

 

[Yuri_G]

One option I would have voted for is not having to support incumbent auto manufacturers. Their history serving the public is sketchy at best, and downright nefarious at worst. I'd rather support a company that truly wants to do good, even if they are flawed.

 

[omgwtfbyobbq]

If I could, I would pick every option but two.

 

[jkirkwood001]

If I could, I would pick every option but two.

Out of curiosity, which two are NOT important to you?

 

[omgwtfbyobbq]

Out of curiosity, which two are NOT important to you?

Mostly Branding, and a little bit Cult of Elon. I do appreciate what he and his companies have done and are doing, but limiting owner access to service manuals and diagnostic tools is bootsy. Not that there aren' t many other things Tesla does well that other manufacturers don't or can't do well, but being able to DIY instead of spending big bucks on labor at the Service Center ain't one of them. To be fair it's also something of a pet peeve for me.

 

[ℬête Noire]

Mostly Branding, and a little bit Cult of Elon. I do appreciate what he and his companies have done and are doing, but limiting owner access to service manuals and diagnostic tools is bootsy. Not that there aren' t many other things Tesla does well that other manufacturers don't or can't do well, but being able to DIY instead of spending big bucks on labor at the Service Center ain't one of them. To be fair it's also something of a pet peeve for me.

I understand why they've put off biting this bullet but yup, it's time is quite ripe at this point.

 

[ebmcs03]

I chose marked as first affordable EV. But it’s not true anymore. I made a reservation because It was what I believed when it was unveiled two years ago. $35k. It’s now $50k minimum.

 

[Goatdan]

Folks who answered "not having to pump gas" or similar could simply buy a Chevy Bolt and save money and get their car now

I went to a Chevy dealership to test drive one. The range was decent, but not enough to so longer trips with easily at this time. The dealership also told me it was silly to consider it and tried steering me to a gas car. They then said, "Yeah, you might be able to work with this because you don't go anywhere." when I told them we don't do that many long trips.

Needless to say, I wasn't impressed. And from what I can tell, there is no longer range solution for them with an actual high speed network.

Night and day difference from the Tesla store I visited.

At least when Nissan called me after we upgraded the Leaf computer there, they offered us a free oil change. For the Leaf.

... And people wonder why those companies aren't selling many cars?

 

[ℬête Noire]

I went to a Chevy dealership to test drive one. The range was decent, but not enough to so longer trips with easily at this time. The dealership also told me it was silly to consider it and tried steering me to a gas car. They then said, "Yeah, you might be able to work with this because you don't go anywhere." when I told them we don't do that many long trips.

Needless to say, I wasn't impressed. And from what I can tell, there is no longer range solution for them with an actual high speed network.

Night and day difference from the Tesla store I visited.

At least when Nissan called me after we upgraded the Leaf computer there, they offered us a free oil change. For the Leaf.

... And people wonder why those companies aren't selling many cars?

How many Bolts did that dealership have? However clumsy and/or dismissive their talking to you was, I can't say the fundamentals of that advice aren't in your best interests. They might have gotten burned by prior customers that didn't understand how limited the Bolt can be for a road trip and ended up with a new customer that flipped out stranded on the road within the "cool off" period that many states have (TX is 3 days, I believe).

The guy we brought ours just flat out didn't know all that much about the vehicle, although he wasn't entirely clueless and was pretty up front about it. The dealership had far more Bolts than any other is the metro area. Most didn't have any. The salesman at least understood the basics of the options, like what DC Fast is and that it isn't available to add after factory. The first dealership we went to nearer us had only 2 vehicles and the single dedicated salesman to them was openly asking me questions about Teslas. He didn't even know about the 3/S difference and such, so I was sort of explaining where he sat in the market. *shrug*

We went to the next dealer because they had stuff we were interested in stock to sell. Although next exactly because their inventory was emptying out, too. In spite of this obvious lack of care and focus, they are actually selling the Bolt as well as their best projections. That's why Chevy has announced they are bumping production volume up again sometime this year.

P.S. Also had "bad info/didn't know what was going on incident with a salesman" situation at a Tesla showroom but at least there I just went to the next person that did know what they were talking about.

 

[jkirkwood001]

Results to date, and conclusions below:

Conclusions

• There have been 250 respondents and 656 total votes so far in 4 days
• "Climate change (100% Electric Vehicle)" is the top vote-getter as exactly half of respondents have picked it as one of the top 3 reasons for owning a Tesla
• "Performance" is second, selected by 43.2% of respondents
• "Range" (37.6%), "Autonomous Driving" (36.8%), and "Innovation" (35.6%) come next almost evenly selected
• Interestingly, exactly half (50.0%) of respondents could not agree on one of the top three reasons. So this suggests it's the completeness of Tesla's vision instead of a single feature that separates it from the pack of ICEs and even from other EVs.
• “Price” was only picked by 10.8% of respondents. This suggests whether a government rebate applies is a small part of determining whether people will buy a Tesla. On the other hand, perhaps this is because the only people participating on the forum have enough disposable income to even consider a Tesla.
• Some good suggestions have come up since the poll was published / locked - including the convenience of home charging, minimal scheduled maintenance & costs, and the golden quietness of EV travel - but even without these additions, the options offered provide a broad selection (7.6% have picked "Other", 8th out of 12).

This is the type of work I do in my job (I'm an independent technology consultant) - but it's fun to apply it to something trivial (but oh so exciting!)

 

[jkirkwood001]

If you're confused, this view shows votes and respondents (up to 3 votes per respondent)