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What's stopping existing car companies from doing direct sales like Tesla? Removing barriers to customers giving you money is generally a win. How many Tesla's

What's stopping existing car companies from doing direct sales like Tesla? Removing barriers to customers giving you money is generally a win. How many Tesla's were purchased in the last year that wouldn't have been if the stressful dealership was in the way? How about a subscription / lease deal where they ship you the new model every year? Sell a cheaper tier for the 2nd year used vehicles. Do telemetry on driver safety and charge accident-prone drivers more! Replace/bundle/improve car insurance while you're at it. Are there regulatory hurdles preventing this for a company like Ford or Toyota? Is it just organizational momentum stalling these changes?

JoeAltmaier 8y ago
Regulation. Most states don't permit car sales without a dealership.
zwily 8y ago
What’s stopping them? Laws in pretty much every state. Laws that have been one of Tesla’s biggest pains. They’ve managed to overturn some of them, but most the time they just get special exceptions carved out for them.
zem 8y ago
there are (good and proper) laws to prevent a car company from having a dealership network that is entirely dependent on them, and at the same time competing with that network by doing direct sales. since tesla doesn't have a dealership network they should technically not fall under those laws, but regulations tend to be 'no' by default (again, probably for good and proper reasons, since there are tons of incentives to game the system otherwise) edit: as per this comment, seems i was wrong about this just being regulators saying no by default: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18772642 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18772642
shwoopdiwoop 8y ago
Volvo is doing exactly that, it’s called Volvo Care if I’m not mistaken and includes some newer cars, service, maintenance, winter tires etc in a monthly fee.
- technobabble 8y ago
  In addition, Lincoln and Geely's Link and Co are also planning something like this.
- mrdoops 8y ago
  Seems like Toyota Connected has similar projects in development - although maybe more focused for on-demand capabilities. Electric and self-driving capabilities aside - this sort of service subscription seems to have no major technological barriers; largely an operations + software problem. Seems like a good way to transition dealerships into service outlets towards larger scale fleet management.

JoeAltmaier 8y ago

Regulation. Most states don't permit car sales without a dealership.

zwily 8y ago

What’s stopping them? Laws in pretty much every state. Laws that have been one of Tesla’s biggest pains. They’ve managed to overturn some of them, but most the time they just get special exceptions carved out for them.

zem 8y ago

there are (good and proper) laws to prevent a car company from having a dealership network that is entirely dependent on them, and at the same time competing with that network by doing direct sales. since tesla doesn't have a dealership network they should technically not fall under those laws, but regulations tend to be 'no' by default (again, probably for good and proper reasons, since there are tons of incentives to game the system otherwise) edit: as per this comment, seems i was wrong about this just being regulators saying no by default: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18772642 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18772642

shwoopdiwoop 8y ago

Volvo is doing exactly that, it’s called Volvo Care if I’m not mistaken and includes some newer cars, service, maintenance, winter tires etc in a monthly fee.

technobabble 8y ago
In addition, Lincoln and Geely's Link and Co are also planning something like this.
mrdoops 8y ago
Seems like Toyota Connected has similar projects in development - although maybe more focused for on-demand capabilities. Electric and self-driving capabilities aside - this sort of service subscription seems to have no major technological barriers; largely an operations + software problem. Seems like a good way to transition dealerships into service outlets towards larger scale fleet management.