The math just doesn't work for Tesla when the backlog of deposits are caught up. Unless Tesla is bringing in 30 new deposits per week, which I doubt in this economy, they will be caught up by the end of 2009.
Lamborghini has 100 dealer locations as a sales channel for their 2,000 cars per year.
Ferrari has 200+ dealer locations as a sales channel for their 6,000+ cars per year.
Tesla has 2 dealer locations and perhaps a handful of new locations planned for 2009. I think between 6 to 8 locations are in the works for Miami, New York, Chicago, Seattle, and the two existing locations in California. There will likely be a couple in Europe.
So my question is, how does Tesla maintain that momentum (30 to 40 per week) with such a limited sales channel of locations? Lamborghini has 100 dealers they can send cars to. Ferrari has 200 dealers to handle this. These dealers each have their own floor financing to buy cars and have on the showroom. So Lamborghini and Ferrari are already paid when the cars ship to their dealers. The dealers carry most of the risk of unsold inventory. The dealers have the carrying costs of financing their floor inventory.
Tesla is not building that model. Tesla owns the sales locations. Tesla could get buried in unsold inventory VERY quickly.
In Seattle (Sept 2008), Darryl Siry mentioned that a sales location won't make sense with only the Tesla Roadster. They also need the Model S to have enough volume for a showroom location to make sense financially. But that was before the Model S was delayed even further and before the $9 million in the bank crisis. Also they did not raise the $100 million they were expecting and the IPO market died.
So here is my question (Siry?). Have they even thought this far in advance? How does Tesla plan to handle this in late 2009 when the backlog is caught up? There is no dealer sales channel to share the risk of inventory carrying costs. And there is no Model S that can justify the costs of Tesla going solo and building dealer showrooms.
I think Tesla will need partners to expand their sales channel quickly. I believe that Tesla will have to find local dealers in all of the major cities and allow them to sell the Roadster as part of their inventory.
You read it here first.
Lamborghini has 100 dealer locations as a sales channel for their 2,000 cars per year.
Ferrari has 200+ dealer locations as a sales channel for their 6,000+ cars per year.
Tesla has 2 dealer locations and perhaps a handful of new locations planned for 2009. I think between 6 to 8 locations are in the works for Miami, New York, Chicago, Seattle, and the two existing locations in California. There will likely be a couple in Europe.
So my question is, how does Tesla maintain that momentum (30 to 40 per week) with such a limited sales channel of locations? Lamborghini has 100 dealers they can send cars to. Ferrari has 200 dealers to handle this. These dealers each have their own floor financing to buy cars and have on the showroom. So Lamborghini and Ferrari are already paid when the cars ship to their dealers. The dealers carry most of the risk of unsold inventory. The dealers have the carrying costs of financing their floor inventory.
Tesla is not building that model. Tesla owns the sales locations. Tesla could get buried in unsold inventory VERY quickly.
In Seattle (Sept 2008), Darryl Siry mentioned that a sales location won't make sense with only the Tesla Roadster. They also need the Model S to have enough volume for a showroom location to make sense financially. But that was before the Model S was delayed even further and before the $9 million in the bank crisis. Also they did not raise the $100 million they were expecting and the IPO market died.
So here is my question (Siry?). Have they even thought this far in advance? How does Tesla plan to handle this in late 2009 when the backlog is caught up? There is no dealer sales channel to share the risk of inventory carrying costs. And there is no Model S that can justify the costs of Tesla going solo and building dealer showrooms.
I think Tesla will need partners to expand their sales channel quickly. I believe that Tesla will have to find local dealers in all of the major cities and allow them to sell the Roadster as part of their inventory.
You read it here first.
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