Tesla, TSLA & the Investment World: the Perpetual Investors' Roundtable

[cliff harris]

Something rarely discussed:
We get very excited about superchargers, but generally superchargers are for road trips. I expect 95% of us charge almost all the time at home and use an SC for long trips. But...
This assumes the viability of home charging. Until recently, Teslas have been pretty expensive, and most people buying one have dedicated off-street parking, such as a garage, car port or driveway.

As Tesla expands, it needs to sell cars to people with no dedicated parking spot, using street parking with zero guarantee of an overnight charger. To make this viable, we need destination charging to become more widespread. Once every mall, every station, every movie theater has chargers in the car park, people will feel more comfortable buying an EV without dedciated parking. Doing so now is... sub optimal.

I'd thus like to see Tesla concentrate a bit more on destination charging rollouts. The more the merrier. I also suspect its easier to do this than new SCs, because the power draw for a 7kw or 22kw charger is probably available much more easily than needing 250kw per bay for an SC?

 

[JupiterMan]

Something rarely discussed:
We get very excited about superchargers, but generally superchargers are for road trips. I expect 95% of us charge almost all the time at home and use an SC for long trips. But...
This assumes the viability of home charging. Until recently, Teslas have been pretty expensive, and most people buying one have dedicated off-street parking, such as a garage, car port or driveway.

As Tesla expands, it needs to sell cars to people with no dedicated parking spot, using street parking with zero guarantee of an overnight charger. To make this viable, we need destination charging to become more widespread. Once every mall, every station, every movie theater has chargers in the car park, people will feel more comfortable buying an EV without dedciated parking. Doing so now is... sub optimal.

I'd thus like to see Tesla concentrate a bit more on destination charging rollouts. The more the merrier. I also suspect its easier to do this than new SCs, because the power draw for a 7kw or 22kw charger is probably available much more easily than needing 250kw per bay for an SC?

At investor day there was an easter egg of what looked like a Tesla parked over an induction charger.

Its likely that induction charging if released would be lower power, so maybe could be offered as a destination charge solution? Now if that could be implemented outside and in public spaces with the relevant automatic hand shake for payment, that would be the ideal solution for destination charging and especially helpful for the demographic without a private driveway, with induction pads wired in underneath public parking spaces at malls, hotels, or even street parking.

If implemented it would provide a very easy way of low speed charging with very little fuss.

 

[spacerfc]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1650596688422117391

 

[Maarten]

Surprised about that woke statement. (The fact that it was made on the report.)

To be clear that quotation in my post was a joke and it's not actually in the Impact Report

Damn, you guys had me there.

 

[SO16]

To be clear that quotation in my post was a joke and it's not actually in the Impact Report

Ah… whoops on my part.

 

[JusRelax]

Just skimmed the rest of the Impact Report. What a damn fine company.

From the report:
99.95% Supercharger uptime

I distinctly recall Elon saying 99.96% uptime, in a recent earnings call.
I fully expect some fine Gojo tweets about "Tesla admits vaunted Supercharger Network is failing"

Sample Reuters report headline:

Should you really buy a Tesla? Tesla supercharger downtime increases by 25% within a span of 1 year, leaving multiple EVs stranded.

 

[yessuz]

Model Y from Berlin on their way west (Belgium/Netherlands), as seen on the German freeway near the border today. Interesting that they are using a truck from Lithuania:

View attachment 917097

this is purely because lithuanian haulers are slightly cheaper than german

 

[unk45]

I wouldn't go that far. To maximize ROAS, an inventory build-up would help a lot. However, there are other considerations. Given Tesla's direct to consumer business model, a significant build-up would not be wise since there isn't space to store too many units. Tesla could easily ship a new Tesla from a nearby store or from the factory within a week or two. Concentrating advertising to one metro area at a time would help figure out what the ideal level of inventory would be. Right now, the Model 3 SR most definitely has accumulated enough inventory for a legitimate advertising campaign anywhere.

Without debating merits of the argument are you recommending advertising in areas where Tesla has no sales distribution capacity? For Model 3 SR specifically, why?

 

[Singuy]

This is xpeng's...EAP I am thinking? Looks like premapped even tho they are claiming they will have fsd without premapped...but this car almost smashed into the wall.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1650759344722685952

 

[kbM3]

I think the main mission-aligned reason to pay for promoting Tesla/EV education campaigns would be to reduce demand for ICEVs and influence general public opinion.

Convincing people to delay buying a new car until they can buy an EV that meets their needs and budget would accelerate the transition. It would put more pressure on legacy auto to move faster and stop fighting the inevitable. It also would influence public policy decisions around stuff like clean energy incentives and streamlining permitting for critical mines for nickel and other key raw materials.

However, this is still a decision that I’d defer to Tesla management on. They have surely been considering this question and have much, much more information than we do.

What? Defer to Tesla management? Don’t you realize every internet commenter is far more intelligent than the entire Tesla executive team, has more data and has studied harder the relative ROI for ad dollars versus other opportunities, and thus in a FAR better position to know Tesla should be advertising!

 

[kbM3]

I like that the Impact Report broke out accident statistics between highway and city.

However, I’m disappointed they did not have another bucket with Active Safety + AP/FSD disengaged.

There’s a valid argument that FSD and AP are often not engaged in the most challenging scenarios. By combining the not engaged statistics with no active safety, we have no idea how much AP or FSD reduce accidents on their own. Only how much they reduce them in conjunction WITH active safety.

 

[unk45]

I personally think .... USP of Tesla is that they have the "try fast and fail fast" philosophy. So they can be very flexible and agile. But, not when it comes to some stuff Elon has a blind allegiance to ... like not doing ads.

Tô be fair, it’s not blind allegiance. Going back to what became Zip2 Elon has consistently been far ahead of most of the Marketing world and vastly ahead of nearly all advertising mavens. From Zip2 to what became PayPal, then SpaceX, Tesla etc he has understood just how to appeal to sponsors, influencers, financiers, governments and other parties. Beginning with Zip2 he has understood how to use technology to optimize marketing outcomes.

The majority of dissenting posts I see here and elsewhere seem not to understand how deeply data driven Tesla’s seemingly arbitrary decisions have been.

As for ‘taking a guess and trying it’, Tesla has followed the scientific method. Which does require using all available data to make ‘the least bad decision’ then refining. They have been doing that, are now doing that and will do that. People who say they cannot know because they have not tried it simply have not been following events very closely.

Clue: look at the highest density areas for Tesla. Then check their business practices in those areas. Just to be explicitly check if Tesla referral results by postal code.

Depending on country, city and data restrictions there is limited widely public data, but with work there are clues. Some of us have some such data, although it is largely paywalled or NDA limited.

Please, everyone, do not assume Tesla is not doing a given thing just because you haven’t seen it, perceived it and your immediate contacts don’t know Tesla.

For further reference carefully examine all advertising expense for the most efficient non-Tesla OEM. Next check their Gross Margin, their growth rate and free cash flow. Next: check Tesla price movements from 2020 through 2023. Then think about it all.

Master Point: Tesla is, by far, the most data driven OEM on earth. Does anybody really think they are ignorant of the largest single sales expense categories for competitors? Lastly, think really hard about ALL the implications of a direct sales model.
Master Point #2: Please examine products and categories with insanely high brand value, high owner loyalty and tiny or zero conventional advertising : examples: Winnebago, Gulfstream, Dassault Falcon, Ferrari, Rolex (yes, print, look where). All of those and many others are deeply involved with buyers and prospects. Right, none are really mass market, not even Harley Davidson really is. However Callebout products are consumed by nearly all of us even though few of us know the name. These are characteristics of products that know their markets.
I could go on…just stop assuming Tesla are ignorant of their business.

To be really fair there is a giant industry that tries hard to promote different views:

Advertising, Marketing, Agency, Tech and Data News | Ad Age

Since 1930, Ad Age is your daily-must read covering the rapid changes taking place in media, retail, food and beverage, sports marketing, travel and more.

adage.com

Once looking at Ad Age a while; just realize the top three locations for paid promotion and online advertising (all advertising share)are:\
Amazon,
Google,
Facebook
Depending on geography, sometimes Alibaba, Baidu, WhatsApp, Twitter, YouTube and handful of others appear. In no major markets anywhere is TV any longer on top.
When thinking about that reality, also recognize that placements are often called advertising when they're placed by advertising agencies. The agency world is still thriving, albeit with large scale concentration.

The more precise the customer attraction and retention needs to be the less likely Advertising agencies are integral. The more deeply data driven the process is the more likely it will be internal. The bigger the budget the more likely Advertising agencies will be at the trough.
Never forget Elon was in precise targeting before most of the world knew it existed, and he's kept learning.

 

[FastEddieB]

A thought experiment:

From strictly an investment ( Value to the company / TSLA) standpoint; would it be a better idea to:

1) raise the price of Supercharging, and lower the MSRP a commensurate amount…

I’d be careful there.

After a recent FL trip, I compared total trip cost with our prior Honda Clarity PHEV @ 42 mpg, and it was quite close at current Supercharger rates and gas roughly $3.19/gal.

Raise Supercharger rates enough so that it costs more than a typical ICE car, and that would be handing ammunition to EV naysayers. WE know that most folks charge at home most of the time, but it’s still not a good look if a Prius costs less to drive on trips than a Tesla.

 

[JRP3]

The charts are absolute (quantity), not relative. Notice that the inventory was higher last winter than it is now.

Then think of it in terms of days of inventory instead of a raw quantity of cars and it's even lower with that in mind.

True but the trend is upwards so worth watching. Also the previous high levels were followed by price cuts.

 

[MP3Mike]

This growth in inventory is of course amid everything that happened in Q1 including the IRA tax Incentives to the price reductions.

Yeah, it is also amid Tesla reducing the delivery wave, which they have stated will cause inventory to increase.

 

[oldTAVguy]

GM ending production of Bolt... Warning CNBS.

GM to end production of electric Chevy Bolt, its first mass-market EV, later this year

The Chevy Bolt EV and EUV, a larger version of the car, make up the vast majority of the company's electric vehicle sales to date.

www.cnbc.com

 

[Krugerrand]

We wouldn’t be discussing advertising if Tesla already did it.

Yes, YOU would. Because it wouldn’t be the ‘right’ kind of advertising. It wouldn’t say what YOU wanted it to say. There’d be a cat in the ad instead of dog; an orange instead of an apple, a black Tesla instead of a blue one -

YOU can’t help yourself. YOU’d nitpick it to death and analyze how it’s wrong in every way until @Unpilot gouged his eyes out. Oh, wait -

 

[UncaNed]

I personally think .... USP of Tesla is that they have the "try fast and fail fast" philosophy. So they can be very flexible and agile. But, not when it comes to some stuff Elon has a blind allegiance to ... like not doing ads.

ADVERTISING =

Isn't there a nice advertising thread for this somewhere??? Please???

 

[unk45]

What? Defer to Tesla management? Don’t you realize every internet commenter is far more intelligent than the entire Tesla executive team, has more data and has studied harder the relative ROI for ad dollars versus other opportunities, and thus in a FAR better position to know Tesla should be advertising!

Really!/s Why can't they read Advertising Age, call TBWA/Chiat/Day and have their inestimable expertise. After all they've done such outstanding work for Nissan over the years, so they know electric cars, and their success with Leaf proves it!/ssss

The very idea of deferring to management threatens an entire industry and obliterates all those wonderful trips, entertaining focus groups, and great dinners. What's worse Tesla doesn't even have an advertising staff to enjoy all those perks./ss

For the record: back long ago, wonderful dinners and trips to colorful resorts competed with driving prototypes and sharing the day with captivating models. Trust management, Never!/sss

All that stuff has never sold cars but we all did generate self-serving data on indeed recall, intention to buy etc. Notwithstanding all that the Porsche Boxster happened that way, and I'm proud to recall makinhgsure the focus group worked properly. Sure, they might have done that anyway with no Expert/s help, but then I would not have spent days and weeks tooling around in fine Porsche vehicles/sss Of course, that was long ago, but ti still works that way, just not for Tesla because those idiotic management think they know better just because they have all the data./ss

That is a personal sarcastic record, I think.

 

[DriveMe]

Has anyone received Tesla Shareholders Meeting invitation yet?
Should be going out any day now...