I can certainly understand the challenges that a new entrant in a field like car manufacturing faces, and I agree that Tesla has generally done a good job. How

I can certainly understand the challenges that a new entrant in a field like car manufacturing faces, and I agree that Tesla has generally done a good job. However, for a general consumer who isn't buying a product to support the mission/company/tech or whatever you want to call it, it's less clear why they would care about that. If <legacy manufacturer> and Tesla both produce cars for $X, it's not unreasonable to do a direct comparison, certainly including reliability, QA, etc. when deciding who earns that $X. Also Tesla has, in fact, been producing vehicles for a decade: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Roadster_(2008) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Roadster_(2008) If you prefer not to count the Roadster as they used the Lotus gliders, the Model S has been out for 6 years as of this summer: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Model_S https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Model_S