14 ms·

A Year and a Half With a Nissan Leaf (Part 1): The Acquisition

53 points by koblenski 13y ago

cake 13y ago
Sounds an awful lot like a free ad for the leaf.
- cadab 13y ago
  Doesn't really paint it in a good light though. Having to fight to buy one, struggling to get home even though it said it had enough range, not being able to use the heater.
  - invaliddata 13y ago
    Regarding the heater, I'm not too familiar with the pre 2013 models, but all 2013s come with standard heated steering wheel and heated seats. This is because running the standard forced air heater uses a significant amount of power by comparison. Most 2013s (all except for the base model) also come with a heat pump instead of a resistive heater, so efficiency of the forced air heater has also improved relative to earlier models (and relative to other similar cars). For people who live in a mild climate, (sf bay area for me), temporary battery capacity loss due to cold weather, or permanent battery damage due to excessively high ambient temperatures, are not an issue, and given the plethora of chargers in this area, I'd say that almost 100% of the driving my family does outside the daily commute (my wife and I drive separately, and we only have one Leaf), is done with the Leaf. I was skeptical about the car initially, but the leases are inexpensive enough not to worry about and it's been a pleasant surprise.
- koblenski 13y ago
  I'm not quite sure how I should take that. If you mean I would highly recommend buying one if it fits your driving habits, then you're definitely right. If you mean I'm just a shill for Nissan, then I can assure you that the only connection I have to Nissan is being a Leaf owner and finding it awesome.
  - cake 13y ago
    No offence intended but I don't see the value of your experience buying a Leaf. To me it lacks a critical opinion, thus looking more like free advertising.
    - koblenski 13y ago
      None taken, but can my experience only add value if I critique the shortcomings? I did relate the troubles I had and how they were overcome. To someone else thinking about buying a Leaf, it could be valuable to know more about how environmental aspects and road conditions affect the range of the car, and how you have to plan for more than just distance. I was intent on buying a Leaf, and I wasn't going to let this initial ordeal sour my opinion of the car because it had more to do with the dealership. I knew going into it that getting the car back to Madison was going to be a stretch, and then events conspired to make it a bit more difficult. I think the fact that I made it back in spite of that was actually a point in the Leaf's favor.
      - cake 13y ago
        but can my experience only add value if I critique the shortcomings Not necessarily only the shortcomings, I was thinking critical as in "analytical", I would have love to read about how the EV experience translated driving out of the dealership for example. It may not be new to you but I've never driven one and would have "extracted value" out of your post if you did describe it ;-)
        koblenski 13y ago
        I think what you're looking for will be in my next post.
- mikestew 13y ago
  Admit it, you didn't read the post, did you? Because if you did, I'm mystified as to how you came to the conclusion it was an ad. It's hardly a glowing post about Nissan's pleasant buying experience.
Amadou 13y ago
What I took away from the blogpost was that when you have a well-defined deployment plan, part of that should include a way to handle exceptions. In this case, he clearly was very enthusiastic about buying a Leaf. That's the kind of customer you want for a new product. How many others like him weren't even within 100 mile radius of any eligible dealers? If Nissan had a process to bump such customers up to a person who handled such purchases as a kind of promotion, who could get a Leaf prepped at a vetted dealer and then flat-bedded to the customer, maybe the goodwill and PR opportunities would have helped them reach their sales targets. http://www.thedetroitbureau.com/2012/11/nissan-will-miss-leaf-sales-targets-says-ghosn/ http://www.thedetroitbureau.com/2012/11/nissan-will-miss-lea...
- koblenski 13y ago
  Well said! On top of that, Madison already had over a dozen charging stations that popped up on the Leaf's navigation system when I first got back home. Nissan should have especially planned for particularly green cities close to their original roll-out states. Now it's not really an issue. We've got two dealerships in the city, and they're both selling 2-4 Leafs per month. I just couldn't wait for mine.
wmeredith 13y ago
So it's a pretty good product hamstrung by a shoddy dealer network/deployment plan(incompetence, arbitrary rules for purchase). This seems to be a trend... A couple weeks ago, after months of research, I decided to buy a Jeep Wrangler Unlimited Rubicon. I went to my local Jeep dealer and took a test drive. The sales guy was fine. It's always kind of annoying when you know more about the vehicle than the person assisting you, but this is mostly par for the course, and he was polite enough. So then we get back to the dealership and it's instantly good cop/bad cop time. I was accosted by a close talker with a fake tan and gold jewelry giving me a hard sell and telling me that he could definitely work something out for me today, while the other guy apologized for him interrupting us. This is a $40,000 vehicle. It's not an impulsive purchase and I was there for a test drive, which they knew. There was zero chance of me buying a car that day for circumstances that had nothing to do with me or them. Anyway, it was a stereotypical scene from there. After 10 minutes of being polite, but firm. I had to physically walk out of the place while they were still talking to me, trying to make a sale. I felt rude, but what else could I have done. I'd still be there if I hadn't. How is this good business? It must be, because I've purchased 5 vehicles (different brands, different geographic areas) in my life and this experience has been about the same for 4 of them. The 5th was a great experience I had with a VW salesman. Even so, his finance guy was rude and tried to screw me over with nonsensical add-ons and a hidden fee that he himself was "surprised" to see in the paperwork when I pointed them out. WTF? The conversation was also full of obsequious fawning BS like, "Wow, I've never seen one go for this low before!" It was very strange. I've been following the Tesla fight against the regulatory capture that car dealerships have implemented. I hope the dealers get buried. Why can't I go online and order the Jeep (or whatever else) I want and have it delivered or pick it up from a non-jackass? Anyway. I'll be buying a used, low mileage Jeep from Carmax. They have fixed pricing and I can view their entire nationwide inventory in detail on their websites. I wish the car manufacturers would get with it. (This is not an ad for Carmax. They are the least of many evils in this situation.)
- ubercore 13y ago
  We had the same experience at a VW dealer. The salesperson was nice, let us take a nice long test drive, and worked out a reasonable deal for us with little pressure. As soon as we went to the finance side, though (we used VW credit), it turned into Glengarry Glen Ross. Additional warranty, extra fees, extra maintenance plans, and on and on. We sat in what felt like an interrogation room saying "no, thank you" for 30 minutes before we could walk out of there.
fkn 13y ago
I think you fit the profile that Nissan was pursuing. Your commute isn't too far and you own another car for the longer trips. I can't see anyone buying a Nissan Leaf as their only car. The range is a big inconvenience. I am curious to see how the battery will handle the cold winters in the long term.
- koblenski 13y ago
  You're absolutely right. This car is not for everyone. Nissan actually had a questionnaire on their Leaf order site to determine if the car was the right fit for your driving conditions. If you didn't fit the profile, they highly recommended against buying one. I think that will change quickly as EVs get longer range and shorter charge times. As for the winters, the first one was pretty mild, but the second one had some dips below zero. During the cold snaps the battery definitely lost significant range, but now that it's summer, the range is practically back to its original amount. There's been very slight degradation of battery capacity so far. I've got plenty of data that I plan to analyze in a future post, but that's for a future post.
- hahainternet 13y ago
  > I can't see anyone buying a Nissan Leaf as their only car. The range is a big inconvenience. Remember that for some, it's no problem. I live in the UK, I have no intention of ever driving more than 100 miles in one go, and if I really need to travel long distances, trains, buses, trams, planes are relatively cheap and available. I doubt a Leaf is what I would buy, but given that Tesla want to allow free charging, so ostensibly free fuel, I can see that as very attractive in the near future.
  - robin_reala 13y ago
    If you’re with Ecotricity in the UK (who peg their electricity prices to match the big 6) then you get free access to their network of chargers: http://www.ecotricity.co.uk/for-the-road http://www.ecotricity.co.uk/for-the-road
- mikeash 13y ago
  A lot of people live life without a car at all. I'm sure there are quite a few people out there who could really benefit from a short-range commuter, but never have a need to drive a car beyond the range of an electric car. For people like that, a Leaf would make perfect sense as their only car. I wouldn't do it, you wouldn't do it, but I wouldn't say that nobody would do it. For people who do want to drive long distances, but not frequently, it could still be a good way to go. Cars are pretty easy to rent, whether from a place like Zipcar or a more traditional rental company like Enterprise. If you drive long distances rarely, it could easily be a win to buy something like a Leaf, then rent on the rare occasions you need more. I find that people often try to imagine every possible eventuality when buying a car, and want to buy something that's capable of it all, no matter how rare these things are required. Well, they say, this car is perfect for our daily needs, but when the sister and parents come to visit once every two years, they won't fit, so we need something bigger. Or, it's perfect, except it won't handle that road trip we've always been dreaming of but never got around to doing. Buying for typical needs and renting for atypical needs is usually cheaper.
jonstjohn 13y ago
I'm in a very similar situation to the OP, minus the new job with a longer commute. My wife and I have shared a car for quite a few years, and even with a 3-year old who goes to school everybody, we make it work. My job is a short 2.5 mile bike ride, and our day-to-day life fits into a relativelly small radius. I had thought that the leaf combined with a all wheel drive vehicle would be perfect for our situation. We live in an area that gets snow in winter and close to the mountains, so AWD would be ideal. The leaf would be great for the day-to-day, which usually involves < 20 miles or driving. We too have an aging corolla, which is a fantastic car for the $$$ and the gas mileage.
IanDrake 13y ago
Leaf=21K, Accent=14K, Commute=11 Miles. It doesn't make economical sense to pay 7K more for a car who's primary feature is low cost per mile, then hardly put miles on the car. Maybe that's just me.
- kirpekar 13y ago
  OP is clearly not in it for the economic sense. A $1000 Craigslist beater or a $20/month bus pass can probably do that commute.
  - kgermino 13y ago
    Or a bike for that matter.
  - IanDrake 13y ago
    A beater isn't an equivalent alternative, nor is a bike or a bus.
- MikeCapone 13y ago
  This argument is made constantly with hybrids and electric vehicles. Yet it is not made for any other vehicle that isn't the most economical option, so it sounds like a double standard to me. I mean, if you look at what's on the road, you'll see a lot of cars that are more expensive than what could do the same job. Some people even pay extra for fancy wheels, sunroofs, bigger engines (which cost more in fuel), cosmetic modifications, etc. So either we need to judge all vehicles purely on economics, or we should admit that car buyers are looking for other things than purely functional transportation at the lowest cost.
  - benajnim 13y ago
    Having worked in deep in the marketing machinery on behalf of big car companies, my take-away is automobile buying decisions are one of the most irrational decisions a person can make. So often, people will purchase a car to address "edge use cases" (e.g. pulling a boat) and most of the time a more economical car combined with renting a vehicle for those edge cases is cheaper. Oh and each model of vehicle has a target demographic, and you may notice the marketing of any given model targets the lifestyle of the buyer. Young, hip and urban? Hard-working man's man? Eco-concious? A car for every lifestyle.
mikestew 13y ago
Summary: the author's experience doesn't surprise me, as it mirrors mine in many respects. It's unfortunate that Nissan did so poorly with the deployment of the initial Leafs. I love ours, and would buy another one, except that every aspect of the buying experience has put me off ever buying another Nissan ever again. I'll repeat: I'll never buy another Nissan. Pre-ordering one was easy enough. After that, the experience went downhill. There were some production delays due to the tsunami, but they were going to have delays anyway, tsunami or not. I'll let that slide, it's a radically different car, things didn't go as planned; whatever. Finally the cars are being delivered. Months go by, and despite having pre-ordered on the first day, no Leaf in my driveway. Then I find out via online forums that people who ordered months after I did are picking up their car. That's completely unacceptable, but whatever, it's just a car. Eighteen months after I entered the initial pre-order, the car arrives and we're off to the dealership. That was probably the final straw for any future Nissan purchases. Despite having arranged a time to pick it up, and having waited eighteen months for the car, we shake hands with the salesman and...wait. After nearly an hour of standing around the dealership drooling over the GT, we are finally deemed worthy of the privilege of receiving the car. After the usual BS with the finance guy, we drive off. I'll reiterate that the car itself is great. It exceeded expectations, and after two years and 16K miles we've had zero trouble with it. But I'm not going to purchase another car from a company that fails at every step to delivery.
hnriot 13y ago
EVs are way too expensive currently with such awful range that for all but a few early-adopter wealthy people with short commutes they are impractical. It's great that people are buying them so we can climb the adopter curve, but until they are competitively priced it's just not worth it. Ironically, for those wealthy short commute early adopters the savings over the next couple years are very small. Cars save money on short commutes, but savings also proportional to commute length, therefore savings are low, but price is much higher. Unless you're convinced these things are actually less destructive to the environment and you have a pile of cash to burn on something other than gas, wait a couple years until battery technology is improved. For me, the only useful advantage is slightly reducing the dependence on the middle east, but the number of EVs on the road vs everything else makes even that so infinitesimally small it's not worth bothering.
- oostevo 13y ago
  I get your larger point about reducing dependence on foreign oil, but ... We actually get more oil from Canada than from the Middle East[1]. We do import the most from all of OPEC combined, but OPEC includes places like Venezuela, from where we get an awful lot of oil, Ecuador, Nigeria, and other countries that aren't in the Middle East. Sorry for being a pedant. [1] http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=727&t=6 http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=727&t=6

53 points by koblenski 13y ago

cake 13y ago

Sounds an awful lot like a free ad for the leaf.

cadab 13y ago
Doesn't really paint it in a good light though. Having to fight to buy one, struggling to get home even though it said it had enough range, not being able to use the heater.
- invaliddata 13y ago
  Regarding the heater, I'm not too familiar with the pre 2013 models, but all 2013s come with standard heated steering wheel and heated seats. This is because running the standard forced air heater uses a significant amount of power by comparison. Most 2013s (all except for the base model) also come with a heat pump instead of a resistive heater, so efficiency of the forced air heater has also improved relative to earlier models (and relative to other similar cars). For people who live in a mild climate, (sf bay area for me), temporary battery capacity loss due to cold weather, or permanent battery damage due to excessively high ambient temperatures, are not an issue, and given the plethora of chargers in this area, I'd say that almost 100% of the driving my family does outside the daily commute (my wife and I drive separately, and we only have one Leaf), is done with the Leaf. I was skeptical about the car initially, but the leases are inexpensive enough not to worry about and it's been a pleasant surprise.
koblenski 13y ago
I'm not quite sure how I should take that. If you mean I would highly recommend buying one if it fits your driving habits, then you're definitely right. If you mean I'm just a shill for Nissan, then I can assure you that the only connection I have to Nissan is being a Leaf owner and finding it awesome.
- cake 13y ago
  No offence intended but I don't see the value of your experience buying a Leaf. To me it lacks a critical opinion, thus looking more like free advertising.
  - koblenski 13y ago
    None taken, but can my experience only add value if I critique the shortcomings? I did relate the troubles I had and how they were overcome. To someone else thinking about buying a Leaf, it could be valuable to know more about how environmental aspects and road conditions affect the range of the car, and how you have to plan for more than just distance. I was intent on buying a Leaf, and I wasn't going to let this initial ordeal sour my opinion of the car because it had more to do with the dealership. I knew going into it that getting the car back to Madison was going to be a stretch, and then events conspired to make it a bit more difficult. I think the fact that I made it back in spite of that was actually a point in the Leaf's favor.
    - cake 13y ago
      but can my experience only add value if I critique the shortcomings Not necessarily only the shortcomings, I was thinking critical as in "analytical", I would have love to read about how the EV experience translated driving out of the dealership for example. It may not be new to you but I've never driven one and would have "extracted value" out of your post if you did describe it ;-)
      - koblenski 13y ago
        I think what you're looking for will be in my next post.
mikestew 13y ago
Admit it, you didn't read the post, did you? Because if you did, I'm mystified as to how you came to the conclusion it was an ad. It's hardly a glowing post about Nissan's pleasant buying experience.

Amadou 13y ago

What I took away from the blogpost was that when you have a well-defined deployment plan, part of that should include a way to handle exceptions. In this case, he clearly was very enthusiastic about buying a Leaf. That's the kind of customer you want for a new product. How many others like him weren't even within 100 mile radius of any eligible dealers? If Nissan had a process to bump such customers up to a person who handled such purchases as a kind of promotion, who could get a Leaf prepped at a vetted dealer and then flat-bedded to the customer, maybe the goodwill and PR opportunities would have helped them reach their sales targets. http://www.thedetroitbureau.com/2012/11/nissan-will-miss-leaf-sales-targets-says-ghosn/ http://www.thedetroitbureau.com/2012/11/nissan-will-miss-lea...

koblenski 13y ago
Well said! On top of that, Madison already had over a dozen charging stations that popped up on the Leaf's navigation system when I first got back home. Nissan should have especially planned for particularly green cities close to their original roll-out states. Now it's not really an issue. We've got two dealerships in the city, and they're both selling 2-4 Leafs per month. I just couldn't wait for mine.

wmeredith 13y ago

So it's a pretty good product hamstrung by a shoddy dealer network/deployment plan(incompetence, arbitrary rules for purchase). This seems to be a trend... A couple weeks ago, after months of research, I decided to buy a Jeep Wrangler Unlimited Rubicon. I went to my local Jeep dealer and took a test drive. The sales guy was fine. It's always kind of annoying when you know more about the vehicle than the person assisting you, but this is mostly par for the course, and he was polite enough. So then we get back to the dealership and it's instantly good cop/bad cop time. I was accosted by a close talker with a fake tan and gold jewelry giving me a hard sell and telling me that he could definitely work something out for me today, while the other guy apologized for him interrupting us. This is a $40,000 vehicle. It's not an impulsive purchase and I was there for a test drive, which they knew. There was zero chance of me buying a car that day for circumstances that had nothing to do with me or them. Anyway, it was a stereotypical scene from there. After 10 minutes of being polite, but firm. I had to physically walk out of the place while they were still talking to me, trying to make a sale. I felt rude, but what else could I have done. I'd still be there if I hadn't. How is this good business? It must be, because I've purchased 5 vehicles (different brands, different geographic areas) in my life and this experience has been about the same for 4 of them. The 5th was a great experience I had with a VW salesman. Even so, his finance guy was rude and tried to screw me over with nonsensical add-ons and a hidden fee that he himself was "surprised" to see in the paperwork when I pointed them out. WTF? The conversation was also full of obsequious fawning BS like, "Wow, I've never seen one go for this low before!" It was very strange. I've been following the Tesla fight against the regulatory capture that car dealerships have implemented. I hope the dealers get buried. Why can't I go online and order the Jeep (or whatever else) I want and have it delivered or pick it up from a non-jackass? Anyway. I'll be buying a used, low mileage Jeep from Carmax. They have fixed pricing and I can view their entire nationwide inventory in detail on their websites. I wish the car manufacturers would get with it. (This is not an ad for Carmax. They are the least of many evils in this situation.)

ubercore 13y ago
We had the same experience at a VW dealer. The salesperson was nice, let us take a nice long test drive, and worked out a reasonable deal for us with little pressure. As soon as we went to the finance side, though (we used VW credit), it turned into Glengarry Glen Ross. Additional warranty, extra fees, extra maintenance plans, and on and on. We sat in what felt like an interrogation room saying "no, thank you" for 30 minutes before we could walk out of there.

fkn 13y ago

I think you fit the profile that Nissan was pursuing. Your commute isn't too far and you own another car for the longer trips. I can't see anyone buying a Nissan Leaf as their only car. The range is a big inconvenience. I am curious to see how the battery will handle the cold winters in the long term.

koblenski 13y ago
You're absolutely right. This car is not for everyone. Nissan actually had a questionnaire on their Leaf order site to determine if the car was the right fit for your driving conditions. If you didn't fit the profile, they highly recommended against buying one. I think that will change quickly as EVs get longer range and shorter charge times. As for the winters, the first one was pretty mild, but the second one had some dips below zero. During the cold snaps the battery definitely lost significant range, but now that it's summer, the range is practically back to its original amount. There's been very slight degradation of battery capacity so far. I've got plenty of data that I plan to analyze in a future post, but that's for a future post.
hahainternet 13y ago
> I can't see anyone buying a Nissan Leaf as their only car. The range is a big inconvenience. Remember that for some, it's no problem. I live in the UK, I have no intention of ever driving more than 100 miles in one go, and if I really need to travel long distances, trains, buses, trams, planes are relatively cheap and available. I doubt a Leaf is what I would buy, but given that Tesla want to allow free charging, so ostensibly free fuel, I can see that as very attractive in the near future.
- robin_reala 13y ago
  If you’re with Ecotricity in the UK (who peg their electricity prices to match the big 6) then you get free access to their network of chargers: http://www.ecotricity.co.uk/for-the-road http://www.ecotricity.co.uk/for-the-road
mikeash 13y ago
A lot of people live life without a car at all. I'm sure there are quite a few people out there who could really benefit from a short-range commuter, but never have a need to drive a car beyond the range of an electric car. For people like that, a Leaf would make perfect sense as their only car. I wouldn't do it, you wouldn't do it, but I wouldn't say that nobody would do it. For people who do want to drive long distances, but not frequently, it could still be a good way to go. Cars are pretty easy to rent, whether from a place like Zipcar or a more traditional rental company like Enterprise. If you drive long distances rarely, it could easily be a win to buy something like a Leaf, then rent on the rare occasions you need more. I find that people often try to imagine every possible eventuality when buying a car, and want to buy something that's capable of it all, no matter how rare these things are required. Well, they say, this car is perfect for our daily needs, but when the sister and parents come to visit once every two years, they won't fit, so we need something bigger. Or, it's perfect, except it won't handle that road trip we've always been dreaming of but never got around to doing. Buying for typical needs and renting for atypical needs is usually cheaper.

jonstjohn 13y ago

I'm in a very similar situation to the OP, minus the new job with a longer commute. My wife and I have shared a car for quite a few years, and even with a 3-year old who goes to school everybody, we make it work. My job is a short 2.5 mile bike ride, and our day-to-day life fits into a relativelly small radius. I had thought that the leaf combined with a all wheel drive vehicle would be perfect for our situation. We live in an area that gets snow in winter and close to the mountains, so AWD would be ideal. The leaf would be great for the day-to-day, which usually involves < 20 miles or driving. We too have an aging corolla, which is a fantastic car for the $$$ and the gas mileage.

IanDrake 13y ago

Leaf=21K, Accent=14K, Commute=11 Miles. It doesn't make economical sense to pay 7K more for a car who's primary feature is low cost per mile, then hardly put miles on the car. Maybe that's just me.

kirpekar 13y ago
OP is clearly not in it for the economic sense. A $1000 Craigslist beater or a $20/month bus pass can probably do that commute.
- kgermino 13y ago
  Or a bike for that matter.
- IanDrake 13y ago
  A beater isn't an equivalent alternative, nor is a bike or a bus.
MikeCapone 13y ago
This argument is made constantly with hybrids and electric vehicles. Yet it is not made for any other vehicle that isn't the most economical option, so it sounds like a double standard to me. I mean, if you look at what's on the road, you'll see a lot of cars that are more expensive than what could do the same job. Some people even pay extra for fancy wheels, sunroofs, bigger engines (which cost more in fuel), cosmetic modifications, etc. So either we need to judge all vehicles purely on economics, or we should admit that car buyers are looking for other things than purely functional transportation at the lowest cost.
- benajnim 13y ago
  Having worked in deep in the marketing machinery on behalf of big car companies, my take-away is automobile buying decisions are one of the most irrational decisions a person can make. So often, people will purchase a car to address "edge use cases" (e.g. pulling a boat) and most of the time a more economical car combined with renting a vehicle for those edge cases is cheaper. Oh and each model of vehicle has a target demographic, and you may notice the marketing of any given model targets the lifestyle of the buyer. Young, hip and urban? Hard-working man's man? Eco-concious? A car for every lifestyle.

mikestew 13y ago

Summary: the author's experience doesn't surprise me, as it mirrors mine in many respects. It's unfortunate that Nissan did so poorly with the deployment of the initial Leafs. I love ours, and would buy another one, except that every aspect of the buying experience has put me off ever buying another Nissan ever again. I'll repeat: I'll never buy another Nissan. Pre-ordering one was easy enough. After that, the experience went downhill. There were some production delays due to the tsunami, but they were going to have delays anyway, tsunami or not. I'll let that slide, it's a radically different car, things didn't go as planned; whatever. Finally the cars are being delivered. Months go by, and despite having pre-ordered on the first day, no Leaf in my driveway. Then I find out via online forums that people who ordered months after I did are picking up their car. That's completely unacceptable, but whatever, it's just a car. Eighteen months after I entered the initial pre-order, the car arrives and we're off to the dealership. That was probably the final straw for any future Nissan purchases. Despite having arranged a time to pick it up, and having waited eighteen months for the car, we shake hands with the salesman and...wait. After nearly an hour of standing around the dealership drooling over the GT, we are finally deemed worthy of the privilege of receiving the car. After the usual BS with the finance guy, we drive off. I'll reiterate that the car itself is great. It exceeded expectations, and after two years and 16K miles we've had zero trouble with it. But I'm not going to purchase another car from a company that fails at every step to delivery.

hnriot 13y ago

EVs are way too expensive currently with such awful range that for all but a few early-adopter wealthy people with short commutes they are impractical. It's great that people are buying them so we can climb the adopter curve, but until they are competitively priced it's just not worth it. Ironically, for those wealthy short commute early adopters the savings over the next couple years are very small. Cars save money on short commutes, but savings also proportional to commute length, therefore savings are low, but price is much higher. Unless you're convinced these things are actually less destructive to the environment and you have a pile of cash to burn on something other than gas, wait a couple years until battery technology is improved. For me, the only useful advantage is slightly reducing the dependence on the middle east, but the number of EVs on the road vs everything else makes even that so infinitesimally small it's not worth bothering.

oostevo 13y ago
I get your larger point about reducing dependence on foreign oil, but ... We actually get more oil from Canada than from the Middle East[1]. We do import the most from all of OPEC combined, but OPEC includes places like Venezuela, from where we get an awful lot of oil, Ecuador, Nigeria, and other countries that aren't in the Middle East. Sorry for being a pedant. [1] http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=727&t=6 http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=727&t=6