I think Bark's last statement was referring to the rest of the auto industry, not Tesla.
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US Tesla Sales Continue Downward Slide.
- Thread starter alevek
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As I said:
But someone e.g. also said this:
One of the reasons why I say iPhone is a bad example. iPhone in August is hurting from a new one coming next month or two. A Tesla is not. We're better off retiring the iPhone as a comparison in this thread.
Sure, sure. But iPhone is a bad comparison by anyone.
I'm not sure Camry, which has clear model years, is much better. Obviously sales slack towards the next model year switch...
We need something as a comparison that changes many times every quarter. Anyone figure out another product that does that?
Well, it's been argued in this thread that the Model 3 could have some bearing on the decline. If so, I'd say the comparison is apt.
dhanson865
Well-Known Member
InsideEVs estimates monthly only, quarterly numbers are taken from Tesla provided numbers freely available to anyone that cares to read the quarterly statements that are required for a public company.
Once the quarter's numbers are revealed insideEVs goes back and revises the 3 months to equal the published quarterly number.
Still many reasons to not be worried, I just wanted to clarify your misconception.
dhanson865
Well-Known Member
Cycle life isn't an issue for the leaf, Heat is.
The leaf has no active cooling. No liquid moves around or through the pack, no air flows through the pack (it's sealed). Heat just builds up in there and cooks the cells.
So long as the municipalities getting the leaf don't' see above 80F on a frequent basis the Leaf will hold out just fine.
It would be a bad example in Florida, Texas and the desert southwest for sure.
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I agree. There are a lot of people out there who would buy a Model S if they could get one. In general though sedan sales in the US are falling off a cliff. I've been reading that there is a glut of off lease sedans in the US right now and it's made the used sedan market a buyer's market. It's probably also making the new sedan market soft.
I would not be surprised if they do drop the price. They have three factors that will come into play once the Model 3 is up and in full production:
1) The cost of many materials that go into the S and X will decline because they will be buying them in larger volume. This includes sheet aluminum, wire, fasteners, etc.
2) Once they convert the S and X battery packs to the 2170 cells, the price of the packs should drop.
3) With the Model 3 bringing in profits, the need to make large gross profits on all cars sold goes down.
If they reduced the price of the Model S by $10K-$20K, sales would go up because there are a lot of people who would buy a Model S if they could afford it. Every price drop puts the Model S in the range of more people. I think the price should be on par with the upper range of Lincoln and Cadillac. That would probably crush sales for those nameplates.
The cells used in stationary storage are a different chemistry from those used in the cars. I believe the production lines for the two are separate. The big storage project in Australia will probably impact Powerwall production though.
The decline could also be due to the end of free supercharging for a while. Most of the first quarter deliveries were cars bought before January 15, 2017 and it's almost certain they saw a sharp drop in sales after that because they brought back free supercharging until the end of the year. The sales made after free supercharging was brought back are largely not final yet (Q3 deliveries).
stopcrazypp
Well-Known Member
Model year switch has to do with it, but car buying tends to slow down in the end of the year also due to people on vacation. And despite Tesla not going with traditional model years, all the traditional value estimation tools (KBB, Edmunds, now Truecar) still use the year as a differentiator. Similarly, the traditional car buyer looking for a Tesla may still follow the same idea (a 2016 Tesla being worth more than a 2017 Tesla).
I don't buy the argument that simply because Tesla introduces features with no set schedule that these seasonal trends are completely eliminated and the "natural" state of sales should be continuously up (ignoring at the moment the supply based issues too).
While true, Tesla hasn't provided regional allotment numbers each time. So there's actually still a lot of slop with the numbers InsideEVs provides. They true it up a bit to match the overall global count and when Tesla does provide regional snapshots, they try to true it up some more.
omgwtfbyobbq
Active Member
Why would they? Tesla's going to do whatever they have to do to avoid producing their 200,000th US vehicle sale in Q4 of this year. They could throttle Model 3 production to do this, but my guess is they'll slow down Model S/X production because everyone's keeping a close eye on Model 3 production.
Given their US sales through the first half of this year, they're on track to have sold ~151,000+ EVs (Roadster, Model S, Model X) in the US by the end of 2017, not including Model 3 production. If they can increase Model 3 production by 4,000-5,000 cars per month, starting from a few hundred to maybe a thousand units in August, they'll be able to deliver ~48,000+ Model 3s in 2017 without hitting the 200,000 vehicle EV tax credit limit for US EV sales.
I think your analogy concerning reducing Model S pricing to keep it competitive V/S the Model 3 is flawed, and here is why.
Mercedes Benz, BMW, Lexus, etc. do not "drop the prices" of the S600, or the 7 Series, or the LS460 to be competitive with their down market offerings. The cars are not competing in the same space for those that want a BMW 7 Series ... a 3 Series simply will not do and so on. I would be a good example I "could have" got in line for a Model 3 but I wanted a larger platform therefore I chose a CPO S. at a higher price point than a New Model 3. People still buy Cadillac Escalades when it is really nothing more than a spiffed up Chevy Suburban.
And there are many more examples of this across many brands.
Neither do I claim any such thing. As I said, seasonality definitely has an effect - but then so does product changes. We are probably better of not comparing Tesla sales to products that have annual updates (e.g. iPhone is a bad comparison in general), but that does not mean we should for example not compare Tesla's own sales season to season. We definitely should.
In today's moment of time I agree. Model 3 is causing a similar effect. However we were talking of several quarters of consequtive decline - nor does the iPhone comparison generally apply to Tesla for reasons discussed above.
What is different about the Model 3 effect too is that it would be like iPhone sales stalling due to people waiting for iPhone SE. It would be of concern for Apple profit-wise. iPhone is just a bad analogy.
As there are very few other products with the type of multiple product changes each quarter that Teslas have, we are probably better off sticking to comparing Teslas own season to season sales than trying to find analogies.
And those U.S. numbers do look at least less bad than consequtive.
While true, few points to consider:
1) Model S is not really a 7 Series or A8 competitor even if it is priced like one. It does not have the comforts. It is more a 5-6 Series or maybe Audi A6-A7... (Even Elon agreed in a tweet.) So it is fairly pricey for such a car. Tesla could decide to bring its base price down while still sticking to the A6-A7 price bracket. (While Model 3 remains in the A4-A5 range.)
2) Model S (and to a lesser degree Model X) are rather unique cars in the sense that being the only large-battery cars on the market they have been attracting more buyers irrespective of usual car class or size preferences or considerations.
3) The unique position of S/X does not even completely change with Model 3, though of course latter is a big deal. But Model 3 is a sedan and thus lacks the hatchback, wagon and CUV alternatives usually found in its class. Model S hatchback and Model X SUV remain the only alternatives for latter car types...
The lack of large battery EV alternatives is sort of focusing a very large potential pool of buyers on these cars, who are willing to buy out of class if the conditions are right (e.g. Model S 60 2 year lease selling to Prius owners).
Tesla might thus well be served by bringing Model S/X base price down a bit, at least until there are more models...
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S&X delivered globally:
2016 Q1 14810
2016 Q2 14402
2016 Q3 24821
2016 Q4 22200
2017 Q1 25418
2017 Q2 22000
They obviously stopped investing in S&X production a year ago. Panasonic probably does not want to invest in 18650 cells any more. Their quarterly production will remain in about 24000. How much of this is sold in USA is not known exactly and can change for many reasons.
I see no reason to worry.
They sorta did with the latest changes. The comp went from the 530i/530e at $54/55k to somewhere between the 540i and M550i $55k/73k. Basically, it moved $5 to 10k in comp by increasing performance without increasing price or losing efficiency. Like moving up from the base turbo 4 to a 6 or 8 for no charge and no fuel mileage penalty.
I believe the S and X production lines combined have the capacity to produce about 50,000 cars a quarter. I've seen some articles claiming the X line alone is capable of producing 3000 cars a week. Though I think there are probably some other limits in that production chain that would keep them well below 200,000 cars a year on the S and X lines. 100,000 a year might be possible with some improvements to their processes. I expect some of the lessons learned setting up the Model 3 lines will make their way into the Model S and X lines and will save both time and money in the long run. It may also contribute to making the quality more consistent.
At the current price of the cars, demand probably wouldn't support an increase much beyond where they are now. If they drop their prices $20K, demand would at least double.
Well... I can't tread into NDA territory, but if you visit the Fremont plant, you'd see what the issue is with scaling S/X production. So examine these statements by Musk in the Q1 earnings call:
Yes, they can make more. It will affect gross margin to make more right now, and they're not focused on increasing S/X production at the expense of margins (and potentially employee happiness) right now. I agree with you that they will likely revisit the design of the S/X as well as the production design of the S/X general assembly lines to increase production at some point, probably in 2018.
As for demand, Musk said,