The LA Sales & Service center

[graham]

Chris Paine's Tesla arrives in L.A. Apparently Sig #23

My Tesla arrives in Los Angeles! | Revenge of the Electric Car

It’s alive! It’s alive! It’s alive!

My brand new silver all-electric Tesla Roadster sportscar (#23) arrived by truck in Los Angeles yesterday. Shrouded in plastic and tucked into the back of a semi with three other Tesla’s, it waited to be rolled onto the streets of Los Angeles.

My nervousness turned to pure joy as it eased down and I got to drive it into the showroom for its final set of checks. Wow! What a beauty.

It’s been five years since my last silver all electric sports car, a GM EV1, was infamously destroyed. Since then, I’ve had the pleasure of driving a Toyota Rav-4 EV conversion. But this week takes me right back to car heaven. America’s first ground-up design pure electric sportscar since the EV1 arrives again. Hurrah!!

Also covered by AutoBlog Green: Chris Paine's Tesla Roadster arrives in LA - AutoblogGreen

 

[doug]

 

[graham]

Interesting that they spill so many customer cars out onto the showroom floor in L.A. compared to what they do in Menlo Park. I assume it is mostly that they have so much less room.

 

[doug]

Interesting that they spill so many customer cars out onto the showroom floor in L.A. compared to what they do in Menlo Park. I assume it is mostly that they have so much less room.

Not sure what you mean. These days they keep plenty of customer cars that are ready for pick-up or delivery in the Menlo Park showroom. It certainly looks better from the street.

 

[graham]

Oh? Maybe I am out of date. The last few times I have been in Menlo Park the showroom had mostly VPs. The customer cars were crammed bumper to bumper in the service area. I guess that is just luck of the draw the few days I have gone by Menlo Park recently.

 

[doug]

Oh? Maybe I am out of date. The last few times I have been in Menlo Park the showroom had mostly VPs. The customer cars were crammed bumper to bumper in the service area. I guess that is just luck of the draw the few days I have gone by Menlo Park recently.

See photos here. They do clear out the showroom when there's an event there than evening, which seems to happen fairly often.

 

[doug]

seems they keep the floors clean. :wink:

 

[TEG]

I was down in LA for the past few days taking the kids to Disneyland, and visiting my dad down the street from the Tesla LA store.

I snapped a couple of quick pix of the store at night:

 

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The Deuce.

Wonder what other names they had/have for things?

 

[doug]

Good number of cars in the LA shop:



Btw, it's SOP to deliver the Roadsters in LA with the front plate mount. Fortunately, they just hand you the mount in Menlo Park.

 

[doug]

 

[siry]

some trivia: "The Deuce" was coined as a double entendre by Tom O'Leary because EP2 was very unreliable and worn out so it was becoming increasingly difficult to use for sales. That was just prior to the sales fleet being refreshed with VP9 and 10.

 

[doug]

Nothing particularly new here, but I stopped by the LA store while I was down there and snapped a few photos. Tesla Motors LA store - a set on Flickr

The aesthetic design is quite nice, though the place is a lot smaller in person than it appears in photos. Menlo Park is absolutely huge in comparison.

Some TV stars were there for a test drive:

 

[action7981]

Stopped by the L.A. store on Saturday to see the Model S in person and overheard a Telsa employee speaking with a customer about the size of the store and service area (which is quite small considering it services the entire L.A. area). The Tesla employee mentioned that they will probably be relocating the store in the next 2yrs to a larger location.

 

[graham]

I vaguely remember them saying something to that effect at the LA Store opening. And the same for the Menlo Park store since it is a short-term lease. Both were temporary spaces while the company is still growing/changing. I wonder if that will be the case with the NY and Chicago stores too?

 

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Old LA store

New LA store

Santa Monica 3rd St Promenade

 

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A few doors away from the Apple store.

 

[DrTaras]

Old LA store
New LA store
Santa Monica 3rd St Promenade

I like the picture contrast; thank you for posting

 

[vfx]

New store at the 3rd street Promenade
Opening day.

 

[Brent]

I just walked by a new store going in at the Westfield Century City Shopping Center, said to open Spring 2013. I'll try to get some shots later. In a bit of irony not lost on anyone, it will occupy the same space that Coda had for a year or so.