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Why do things have to change constantly? Like the Model Y was insanely different to any other car I’d ever driven not long ago, and Tesla was first to market on

Why do things have to change constantly? Like the Model Y was insanely different to any other car I’d ever driven not long ago, and Tesla was first to market on actually good electric cars. Why do they have to operate using the same strategy as legacy auto makers? Like a design refresh every 3 years to drive excitement feels manipulative to me, not like something that is absolutely necessary. Are you saying that competitor electric cars are outcompeting them by a wide margin now? I’m not really aware of which ones if so, at least in the American market. AFAIK the electric car program for all of the legacy auto makers is still a money pit for them, is it not?

ageitgey 1y ago
Cars (especially in the US) are an emotional and personal purchase. They are an extension and representation of your personality. It's fashion. The entire history of the US car business has shown that the path to success is to produce different variants for different customer bases and refresh those variants to drive continual sales. Some manufacturers take this to Nike-level extremes with rare variants, 1-of-1 models, etc (looking at you, Porsche). Other manufactures take it to the other extreme with base one platform being repurposed for 5+ different customer segments with wildly different body designs - for example the Toyota Tundra, Tacoma, Lexus LX, 4Runner, and Land Cruiser are all the same car with a different shell. So the conventional wisdom in the industry is that Tesla is committing suicide by producing generic, stale cars without model variants. Tesla seems to have bet that the conventional wisdom is wrong and producing cheap, repeatable cars with less variation is a better business strategy. Time will tell.
array_key_first 1y ago
They don't need to constantly change, it's just that yes: they're being outcompeted, and pretty hard. The legacy automakers are fully in the game and everyone now remembers: oh wait, they know how to make cars. Tesla... ehhh Kia, Hyundai, even GM are really giving Tesla a run for their money in every segment.
- pfannkuchen 1y ago
  So maybe it’s just me, but I hate how the legacy auto makers, even the luxury ones, nickel and dime everything. You buy a $75k car and the frequently touched places are metal, but if you go looking at all you find cheap $15k car tier plastic. With Tesla, the entire car is made of a few middle of the road materials. I don’t want the cheap plastic, but I also don’t want a facade. I just want reasonable quality everywhere. I feel like cars that don’t do that are lying to me. Also Tesla basically succeeded at replicating an iPad as the screen, which to this day no one else has done. I think they actually poached part of the iPad team to do it. Tesla makes their own fabrication machines in house, so their body panels don’t have to look like every other manufacturer that uses standard supplier machines. And I’m not referring to the cyber truck, the shape of the main line cars is not achievable with the standard equipment, which is why they are able to stand out visually. Where are the competitor electrics beating out Tesla? Are the acceleration dynamics better? Is the handling better? Is the screen better? I’m guessing the seats are more comfortable, and the interior is bifurcated into nicer and less nice parts with the average niceness being about the same. They might be dumping here though since they are still burning through cash on these cars AFAIK, so I think it remains to be seen whether whatever advantages they have in the comfort and materials areas are sustainable. (For the record, the electric door openers and the self driving labeling are both moronic, but when you have a dictator you can’t really avoid getting some bad stuff where the individual guy turns out to be wrong about something).
  - array_key_first 1y ago
    Well it's nice that Tesla cars are uniquely made, but they are very ugly to the average consumer. More traditional cars produced by legacy makers just... look better. To most people. Legacy makers are producing cars with things consumers actually want. Higher quality interiors, nice exteriors, good ride dynamics, Apple car play, and competitive price points. I think the reality is that most people actually don't care about Teslas big screen or autopilot. They want a car thats somewhat normal that does car things and does them well. They want good range, comfy seats, and steering wheel stocks. Kia provides that, Hyundai provide that, pretty much everyone provides that except Tesla. The extra acceleration points doesn't matter. It's never really mattered, that's just a spec sheet bragging point.
jonway 1y ago
There are plenty of very, very good EV out there, have been for years but those other automakers are already servicing shareholders with pretty reliable profits. As a result they just treat ev and hybrids like any other model for the most part wrt marketing and so forth. It’s understandable that you wouldn’t want to cannibalize regular sales and service. Financially, they don’t need to. It does help their CAFE fleet standards. It doesn’t make as much sense for Toyota since they have some of the segment (economical or environmental buyers) covered by Camry and Prius, which they’ve been making for like 30 years. As for “why should cars change every 3 years”, well, they don’t. Other automakers typically develop a platform and use it as a base for many models over several to many years. Mercedes-Benz platforms have lasted over a decade, encompassing many badges. GM make Escalades and Yukons, they are the same platform with different options. There is a sure benefit of Tesla: competition in the EV space, since they had no product to match GM. Just an aside, electric cars aren’t even close to new, Tesla was not first to market. They were pretty popular 120 years ago, but clearly things change.

ageitgey 1y ago

Cars (especially in the US) are an emotional and personal purchase. They are an extension and representation of your personality. It's fashion. The entire history of the US car business has shown that the path to success is to produce different variants for different customer bases and refresh those variants to drive continual sales. Some manufacturers take this to Nike-level extremes with rare variants, 1-of-1 models, etc (looking at you, Porsche). Other manufactures take it to the other extreme with base one platform being repurposed for 5+ different customer segments with wildly different body designs - for example the Toyota Tundra, Tacoma, Lexus LX, 4Runner, and Land Cruiser are all the same car with a different shell. So the conventional wisdom in the industry is that Tesla is committing suicide by producing generic, stale cars without model variants. Tesla seems to have bet that the conventional wisdom is wrong and producing cheap, repeatable cars with less variation is a better business strategy. Time will tell.

array_key_first 1y ago

They don't need to constantly change, it's just that yes: they're being outcompeted, and pretty hard. The legacy automakers are fully in the game and everyone now remembers: oh wait, they know how to make cars. Tesla... ehhh Kia, Hyundai, even GM are really giving Tesla a run for their money in every segment.

pfannkuchen 1y ago
So maybe it’s just me, but I hate how the legacy auto makers, even the luxury ones, nickel and dime everything. You buy a $75k car and the frequently touched places are metal, but if you go looking at all you find cheap $15k car tier plastic. With Tesla, the entire car is made of a few middle of the road materials. I don’t want the cheap plastic, but I also don’t want a facade. I just want reasonable quality everywhere. I feel like cars that don’t do that are lying to me. Also Tesla basically succeeded at replicating an iPad as the screen, which to this day no one else has done. I think they actually poached part of the iPad team to do it. Tesla makes their own fabrication machines in house, so their body panels don’t have to look like every other manufacturer that uses standard supplier machines. And I’m not referring to the cyber truck, the shape of the main line cars is not achievable with the standard equipment, which is why they are able to stand out visually. Where are the competitor electrics beating out Tesla? Are the acceleration dynamics better? Is the handling better? Is the screen better? I’m guessing the seats are more comfortable, and the interior is bifurcated into nicer and less nice parts with the average niceness being about the same. They might be dumping here though since they are still burning through cash on these cars AFAIK, so I think it remains to be seen whether whatever advantages they have in the comfort and materials areas are sustainable. (For the record, the electric door openers and the self driving labeling are both moronic, but when you have a dictator you can’t really avoid getting some bad stuff where the individual guy turns out to be wrong about something).
- array_key_first 1y ago
  Well it's nice that Tesla cars are uniquely made, but they are very ugly to the average consumer. More traditional cars produced by legacy makers just... look better. To most people. Legacy makers are producing cars with things consumers actually want. Higher quality interiors, nice exteriors, good ride dynamics, Apple car play, and competitive price points. I think the reality is that most people actually don't care about Teslas big screen or autopilot. They want a car thats somewhat normal that does car things and does them well. They want good range, comfy seats, and steering wheel stocks. Kia provides that, Hyundai provide that, pretty much everyone provides that except Tesla. The extra acceleration points doesn't matter. It's never really mattered, that's just a spec sheet bragging point.

jonway 1y ago

There are plenty of very, very good EV out there, have been for years but those other automakers are already servicing shareholders with pretty reliable profits. As a result they just treat ev and hybrids like any other model for the most part wrt marketing and so forth. It’s understandable that you wouldn’t want to cannibalize regular sales and service. Financially, they don’t need to. It does help their CAFE fleet standards. It doesn’t make as much sense for Toyota since they have some of the segment (economical or environmental buyers) covered by Camry and Prius, which they’ve been making for like 30 years. As for “why should cars change every 3 years”, well, they don’t. Other automakers typically develop a platform and use it as a base for many models over several to many years. Mercedes-Benz platforms have lasted over a decade, encompassing many badges. GM make Escalades and Yukons, they are the same platform with different options. There is a sure benefit of Tesla: competition in the EV space, since they had no product to match GM. Just an aside, electric cars aren’t even close to new, Tesla was not first to market. They were pretty popular 120 years ago, but clearly things change.