The first quarter of 2025 wasn’t a great one for Tesla. While it’s still the world’s second-largest electric carmaker, global sales are down 13 percent compared to the first quarter of 2024. Amid chatter about Model Y production changeover, it certainly appears like the Tesla Cybertruck is losing sales momentum, and it’s not hard to see why.
For context, industry analysts Cox Automotive reported that Tesla sold 12,991 examples of their stainless-clad truck in the fourth quarter of 2024, down 22.17 percent from third-quarter sales of 16,692 units. Keep in mind, these are just U.S.-market sales, whereas Tesla’s own sales reports aren’t just global, but they also have some model-grouping weirdness to them.
See, the Model 3 and Y are lumped together, and then all other models are lumped together, a vague and unusual way of reporting sales considering every other major manufacturer breaks it down model-by-model. However, global Model S, Model X, and Cybertruck sales combined last quarter totalled 12,881 units, a significant decline no matter how you break it down.
For one, it’s not like Tesla just stopped selling Model S sedans and Model X SUVs, so those products likely take a small chunk out of global sales. Then there’s the fact that the U.S.A isn’t the only place to get the Cybertruck. I’ve seen a fair few rolling around Toronto, although current Canadian sales volume is probably relatively low given Canada’s overall market size and everything that’s happened in recent months.
Ah yes, the happenings of recent months. Look, we try not to get too political here because this is a car site and just about every major automaker has skeletons in the closet. Henry Ford was no saint, Mitsubishi and Subaru made warplanes before cars, Mercedes-Benz’s history in the ’30s and ’40s is probably self-explanatory, GM played both sides, the list goes on. However, there is a difference in experience between reading about past actions and watching things play out in real time.
From breaking Twitter to sowing chaos with DOGE, Elon Musk is a particularly unpopular public figure, and the Cybertruck will forever be linked closely to him. It’s his brainchild, and with the cars we drive saying something about who we are, that link between creator and product makes it easy for some to draw conclusions about those who choose to drive Cybertrucks over F-150 Lightnings, Chevrolet Silverado EVs, Rivian R1Ts, and GMC Hummer EVs.
With incidents of vandalism, road rage, and general vitriol against the Cybertruck on the rise, it wouldn’t be surprising if some consumers are re-thinking whether they actually want to live with the truck. One writer from the Atlantic drove a rented Cybertruck for a day and reported “I had been flipped off at least 17 times, called a ‘motherfucker’ (in both English and Spanish), and a ‘fucking dork.'” Imagine putting up with that on a daily basis.
Granted, the Cybertruck’s image problem doesn’t paint the full picture of why sales might be dropping off. For one, it’s expensive. A dual-motor model starts at $81,985 including freight, and that sort of money gets you into all manner of other well-equipped electric pickup trucks. Then there’s the reputation of its build quality. It’s not particularly confidence-inspiring when a vehicle gets recalled for having panels fall off. Oh, and decisions like the tall sail panels and the tonneau cover that slides over the rear window hamper usability, and if you’re spending this sort of money on a car, it better be functional for its intended purpose.
Then again, I suspect few of those who’ve canceled their Cybertruck reservations have done so out of actual product concerns. I also suspect sales won’t drop to zero, since there’s likely a contingency of people who want a Cybertruck because of everything it stands for rather than in spite of it. The problem is that regardless of the product, whether a truck or a soap or a beverage, in order to sell in huge numbers, it needs to appeal to a massive number of people. The Cybertruck may simply be too controversial to ever do that.
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How can anyone be surprised that this vehicle isn’t selling? Sadly every single thing we do now is part of this exhausting culture war. The right hates EVs. The left hates Musk. That puts the Tesla brand in the amazing position of having negative brand equity with a majority of the population. It’s so extreme that even those of us who recognize that we should all drive what we want still cringe when we see one.
The Model 3 and Y are ubiquitous enough and innocuous enough that most people just kind of look past them, understanding that their owners are mostly normies who bought a compelling electric car with the best charging network at a competitive price.
The Cybertruck, however, with its super aggressive and impractical profile, stands out in traffic like a massive culture-war middle finger to everyone it passes. It’s the ultimate negative virtue signal that covers the entire spectrum of bad politics.
People who see one in the wild are left to wonder, is the guy driving that a lunatic MAGA type gloating while his idol gleefully fires thousands of public employees? Or is he a righteous EV-loving eco warrior who’s judging my old ICE car? An insufferable Tesla Stan who bought his CT from the proceeds of buying meme stocks? A tech bro douche making a Youtube video sponsored by monster energy? Or is he the worst of all – the aloof rich guy with some money to burn and so little empathy or self awareness that he can afford to be above all the little people and their culture war anxiety and drive the truck “just cause I think it looks cool.” You never know which of those drivers is behind the wheel, but regardless of your personal politics it’s hard to imagine the level of denial you’d have to be in all day as you drive that thing around taking up all that visual space and pretending everyone around you, left right and center, didn’t hold you in some form of culture war contempt.
Not to disagree with your analysis, but I look at the CT differently.
Tesla COULD have used the prototype CT as a design exercise, and then built something suited for the purposes people buy light trucks. You know, practical. Tesla could have built something that would make us ask, “Anyone remember Rivian?”
My biggest disappointment with the CT is it was such a missed opportunity. In the future, after Tesla crashes and burns, we will read books written by insiders who will detail the millions of dollars squandered on inventing manufacturing processes for a vehicle no one wanted, and the anguish of those who knew they worked on a lost cause.
The waste. The hubris. The opportunity cost.
Kind of appropriate that it resembles a DeLorean.
A case study similar to “New Coke”
By people that were apparently on coke.
Classic coke, not Coke Classic.
At this point, nearly everyone but wierdo incel wannabe edgelords hate Musk. After this week, even Trump is giving him the boot.
But it isn’t all about Musk. The CyberTruck is just *stupid* in so many ways. It’s not fit for purpose other than as a “look at me” ego statement (and now that has pretty well worn off too). There are only so many people who fit in that category who can afford one.
A very reasoned post.
My son, who owns a CT, is really none of the types of people you mentioned, however. He’s young and loves the latest tech and has wanted one since it was introduced. Having the means, he finally did. I just hope he doesn’t receive the vitriol on the road from others. The Marines literally and figuratively beat the ego out of him. 🙂
Interestingly, most of the CTs I see on the highway are being driven…considerately (for lack of a better term). The 3s and Ys on the other hand are often piloted by inconsiderate arseholes who wouldn’t know a turn indicator if it slapped them upside the head.
TL;DR Judge the driver by their driving, not by their vehicle (even if I think Elon permanently belongs in the tenth circle of Hell for all eternity).
Yep I bet a huge number of people who buy the Cybertruck don’t fit any of the easy stereotypes I listed above, including your son. The tl;dr on my post is basically: what a shame that something that could have and should have been a symbol of progress and American ingenuity ended up being one of the most visible symbols of the politics that are tearing us apart.
Please tell your son that some random stranger on the internet is genuinely thankful for his service!
And condolences on his visual impairment. 😉
Ha! Yeah, I have no qualms being simultaneously proud of his accomplishments and ashamed of his taste in trucks. He wanted to show me the acceleration of the thing and I almost Cyberpuked on the carpet.
The past sins of makers like Ford are completely immaterial to the discussion. Supporting Tesla in any way right now is like supporting VW in 1938. It provides material support for the same ideology.
Well said. Every large industrial company that existed made thing for the war efforts, be it Mitsu with the Zero or GM with tanks. Using that as justification for disliking the current company is at best silly.
But Ford, man did he really hate Jewish people.
HFI also died in 1947.
I thumbs down every CT I see. Not flip off, thumbs down, as it expresses displeasure, as opposed to hate. I don’t hate CT drivers, but I sure am disappointed with them.
I point and laugh. It’s the right level of malicious without being overtly threatening.
I’m not angry, I’m just disappointed.
I’m not disappointed, because I never had any expectations in the first place.
Maybe it’s a bad idea to buy an expensive brick you can’t insure and drive.
On Saturday I drove past the Tesla store on East Sahara Ave. in Las Vegas. The lot was suspiciously empty, maybe a dozen cars and 5 CT. A bit further west, I passed the fenced-in lot of an abandoned K-Mart, where this store also stores cars. It was crammed completely full with cars and trucks, and there were easily another 50 vehicles stored outside the fence. Maybe they’ll rent another parking lot somewhere.
Las Vegas is a funny town, politically speaking. The “minority” population is actually larger than the “majority”, and they tend to lean left. But the wealthier folks tend to lean right, some even Libertarian. I suspect there will continue to be overstuffed lots full of Teslas.
I totally don’t expect a billionaire CEO to have much in common with me.
Most of them are not publicly pronouncing their opposition to very existence of poor people or publicly funding and promoting an agenda to make life worse for people who actually have to work for a living.
Regardless of his other opinions, Musk hates working people. He looks at working people with hatred and disgust. Even if you buy his car, even if you vote for his friends, Elon Musk f*cking hates you and wants to see you starve for his entertainment.
This. Why anyone has any love for these billionaires is beyond me…
It’s the real Big Lie. The greatest con the Republican Party ever pulled off was convincing half the population that they’re a few steps away from wealth beyond their wildest dreams. They side with the billionaires because they want to see themselves in them and are deluded into believing it can actually happen…when the reality is that everyone who isn’t a member of 1% is exponentially closer to being on a corner asking for change than becoming a billionaire.
Class consciousness is there waiting for them, they just need to accept it. Unfortunately the right wing propaganda machine is well oiled and very effective. We have our work cut out for us.
Dunning kruger and gullibility. The two most dangerous attributes. Of course they hate scientists.
“Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.” – John Steinbeck
So much this. The ability of the (below) average American to vote against his or her best interests just astounds me, as does the gullibility of them. I guess ignorance IS bliss?
At this point, the 1% are basically working poor compared to the yutzes in Trump’s cabinet, Musk, Bezos, Zuckerburg, Gates, the Waltons, the Kochs, etc. You only need ~$400K or so income to be in the 1%. That is literally couch cushion change to those guys. They are the .0001%. The top 10% in the US hold 67% of the household wealth, the bottom 50% only 2.5%.The wealth inequality today is terrifying. And I say that as someone who is pretty damned well off relatively speaking.
People really have no concept at all of how big a number a billion is, never mind a couple *hundred* billion. A million seconds is 12 days – a billion seconds is almost *32 years*.
As someone who spent a majority of my highschool years researching the Gilded Age because of the similarities I was seeing between 1884 and 2009, the fact that since 2021 we have actually surpassed the wealth inequality of the Gilded Age at it’s peak in 1898 where it was 2,900:1 (4,000 families controlled the majority of wealth of 76,300,000 citizens) and have reached a ridiculous ratio of 1,057,704:1 (46 families controlling the majority of wealth of 320,000,000 citizens) should scare the absolute shit out of people. Even Rockefeller and the Morgan who were the richest people in the world during their era didn’t have as much of a gap between them and the second highest tier under them as Bezos does.
Welcome to the brave new world of technofeudalism.
It really is terrifying. And now they can literally buy the government with not a whole lot to stop them. The government stood up to and dismantled the robber barons back then, but I just don’t see it happening this time. I do think they are going to tire of their loose cannon useful idiot Trump though, and rien him in one way or another.
For this lot, the French approach to reestablishing your republic might be in order.
I would be all for it. I’m good at woodworking, I will happily contribute some guillotines.
Yeah, in terms of spending *relative* to one’s wealth it was noted that when Musk spent 270 million dollars or so on the GOP in the 2024 election it was comparable to the average American spending 45 dollars. And since the election Musk’s wealth has increased by about 70 to 100 billion dollars, heck of a ROI . Good grief.
He’s lost most, if not all of that gain of late.
Sadly, he could lose 99% of his wealth and STILL be a billionaire.
Yeah, like, when Jeff Bezos’s wealth was estimated at a little over 110 billion dollars (either towards the end of Obama’s second term or at the beginning of Biden’s term but I think it was the former) a new tax plan was proposed where the GOP criticized it by saying that under such a plan Bezos would have to pay 10 billion dollars in taxes (Oh no!! Won’t somebody think of the poor billionaires?) while ignoring the fact that even if Bezos did cough up 10 billion dollars for taxes he would *still* be a centi-billionaire.
Recently I saw a joke (as such as it was) online:
Q: What do you call a billionaire who’s lost 10 million dollars?
A: A billionaire.
Yeah, millions are just rounding errors to billionaires.
It’s literally change from their couch cushions.
The US has a real problem with the working class all thinking they are going to be rich someday. Exhibit A – my Trump-loving kid brother.
This is mind boggling to me. For those folks that think they’ll be rich – are they thinking they’ll get that way by association?
I seriously don’t get it, but that’s how they think. It goes right along with having health insurance for the first time in decades thanks to an Obamacare subsidy making it affordable, but being all for Trump and the Republicans who want nothing more than to get rid of that. How do you square that? It’s completely irrational.
Good. Couldn’t be happening to a better vehicle.
The Cybertruck was never going to be a big seller regardless. It’s too weird, expensive, and impractical. Combine that with the anti-Musk backlash and I expect its sales will decline to the point where any other manufacturer would pull the plug. If it stays in production it will be only because Musk refuses to let it be discontinued.
This x100. The market was so limited to begin with, even taking its association with Musk out of the equation. You had to have someone who wanted an unorthodox looking, expensive electric truck. You had to have someone who could live with inevitable Tesla build quality issues.
Add Musk into this and yes, everything associated with him, and it’s no wonder sales of this vehicle have tanked.
I do wonder about it as a business decision. Tesla must have spent massive, massive amounts in R&D on the cybertruck, even you only look at the manufacturing side; probably much more than the average new vehicle development budget.
Musk and his CFO had to have known it wasn’t going to make that money back.
Let’s clarify something. The author from the Atlantic that drove the truck for a day was flipped off way more times than 17 and called much else, they just didn’t see or hear them all. Anytime I see one of these on the road I say, “f***ing dumb s***” but I guarantee the driver normally doesn’t hear me.
Of what?
Axis & Allies, Castle Wolfenstein, Medal of Honor… by way of their Opel division, at least according to some accounts. Others say they were not fully in control of their German manufacturing division, and thus shouldn’t be held accountable. History is unclear on the subject.
They include this comment in the same list as Henry Ford who was a raging antisemite, bought a newspaper just so he could print lies about Jews and espouse his hatred and forced his dealers to carry the paper in their showroom, and was awarded the Grand Cross of the German Eagle by the Nazis (with a proclamation signed by Hitler) and mentioned by Hitler in Mein Kampf.
So, yeah, I would kind of like to know what GM did that they are referring to as well.
Yeah from what I read, the German government demanded they make weapons/war vehicles in their Opel factories, they declined, and the Nazis requisitioned them.
That hardly seems worthy of criticism.
at a minimum can’t be in the same list as Henry Ford ffs. That guy was pos and people need to stop glossing over that.
Henry Ford walked so Elon could run
On the one hand, Citroen faced the same requisition and built the trucks – with dipstick marks well below the point of oil starvation. On the other, they were under occupation while Opel’s plants were in Germany and likely full of people who…let’s say, would later claim they only went to those Nazi meetings for the free beer.
Even if that’s true, it seems like a stretch to blame GM as a corporation for it.
Besides, if we’re using that standard, how many GM employees volunteered to go fight Nazis? I bet it was a lot.
I bet vs facts, but easier to make mental gymnastics not to blame corps/capitalism.
What are we arguing about here?
I responded with a vibes based argument to a previous post also making a vibes based argument.
If you want to assign blame to GM for siding with Nazis in WWII make the case for it.
What any of this has to do with a seeming desire to blame capitalism for everything is beyond me, but have a nice night.
We know where you stand buddy.
I’ve always thought these were dumb. I like odd cars but this thing is a rolling insult to anyone with vision. Seems the majority of the world agrees as there no shortage of $100k vehicles rolling around these days.
It’s a novelty vehicle, like a Chevy HHR or VW New Beetle or PT Cruiser, and those seem to have limited sales life spans, because novelty wears off. Except for being cute and cheerful like those examples, it’s aggressive and expensive. So we might expect the sales life span to be short even setting aside the politics.
Eh, those all sold in large numbers, particularly the PT Cruiser.
Last I heard, none were profitable.
Yes, they sold well but faded quickly– at least for the PT cruiser, sales peaked in its 1st year or true availability and went steadily and then quickly down hill. The arc here is the same, just from a smaller initial base…
The pricing is much different, obviously. I don’t know why but the Chevy SSR pops into my head. The CT is more techno than retro, but like the SSR it seems half-baked. Also the customers are not really clear about what kind of product it is… is it practical or just a statement and styling exercise?
They were also cheap (ish), the Cybertruck’s not.
“One writer from the Atlantic drove a rented Cybertruck for a day and reported “I had been flipped off at least 17 times, called a “motherfucker” (in both English and Spanish), and a “fucking dork.” “
I’ve been outspoken here about how fundamentally absurd I think the CT is, but I’ll never be rude to fellow travelers ( haven’t flipped off anyone since teenage). There are two on my street, though they have been curiously absent in the last few weeks. Please stop emulating repulsive behavior coming from our dear leaders.
I won’t fault people for verbally telling someone how they feel or gesturing. But definitely think actual vandalism goes too far.
I’m of the mindset that you can only control how you respond. Those that promote hostility only look more foolish if none go along.
I’m not going to advocate for property destruction or violence but the right wing outrage over it is hilarious. They all clutch their pearls and say violence is never the answer but they got all hot and bothered at the concept of daddy Trump violently punishing people. Conservatives LOVE violence, it just has to be sanctioned by the state.
Useless wars? HELL yeah. Executions? More of those please. Sending immigrants to concentration camps? Thank GOD father is here and is TAKING OFF HIS BELT mmmmm oh yeah ughhhhh punish those people FATHER punish them real hard.
These people are fucking weird.
You should try to project less.
Their leader pardoned cop killers. And isn’t doing anything about a man improperly deported to an El Salvadoran gulag.
This is the Trumper word of the year so far. Anything negative that’s said about them and their cult leader is PROJECTION! It’s basically the new FAKE NEWS! It keeps them from having to engaging in the things they hate most…critical thinking and looking in the mirror.
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means…
Edit: I probably should’ve said Trumpers in the OG comment though. I don’t just unanimously hate conservatives across the board and there’s plenty of room for the classical conservatives/libertarians/etc who are as appalled by this as we are on the left.
bUt HeR eMaLES!!!!!11 g0Rje SoROs!!!!! BLM ri0ts!!! U hAs TDS!!!!!!
Adding /s because it’s needed in this post sarcasm world.
Ok, Karoline…
The right lost all right to claim they are against violence after January 6th and the Trump pardons. They are the epitome of laws for thee but not for me.
Right? An attempted violent overthrow of our government is totally fine but destroying a Tesla is savagery!
The way they have spun that story after we all watched it happen live is disgusting. Then they just point at stuff like the BLM riots and look stupid. I dislike all politicians but there is nothing remotely this bad on the “left”. It is false equivalency at this point.
I literally lived on East Capitol Street when it happened. I saw all the nut jobs gathering and invading town, I could hear the road of the crowd, I heard a few bangs (potentially the handful of gunshots that were fired), police and EMS were roaring down the street every minute or two…my wife and I decided to cross town and spend the night at my parents’ house.
I then went back to observe the carnage and had to view the Capitol building through a fence for the next several months. I had to lead the effort on providing mental healthcare for the staff at the school system I was working for at the time. I’m legitimately insulted when people in fucking flyover states, the south, etc. have the audacity to try to tell me it was nothing or it was a FaLsE fLaG or something.
I was right down the street. It was real, and it was horrifying. I think if more of them were forced to see, hear, and deal with what everyone who was in DC at that time did they’d feel much differently about it. But therein lies the problem with people who have Trump Brain…they’re literally incapable of feeling empathy for anyone outside of their immediate orbit and nothing is a problem until it harms them directly.
I think it seems like a miserable and isolating way to go through life, but that’s just me.
Well said
Hey Karoline Leavitt said it
It must be true!
/s
They elected a convicted felon. Found guilty of both sexual assault and fraud (multiples of that last one). Of course they like violence.
The only thing that might be somewhat surprising at this point is them still calling themselves ‘the party of law and order’.
In case you are unfamiliar with my stance on the crisis;
Hoonicus
2 days ago
Even P.T. Barnum knew you can’t run a circus with just clowns.
Trump’s tariffs will be “highly disruptive,” says Cox’s Jonathan Smoke. WardsAuto 3/31.
The judicial and legislative branches need to do their sworn constitutional duty, or we are on a very dark path.
Recommend:
https://news.berkeley.edu/2024/09/09/fascism-shattered-europe-a-century-ago-and-historians-hear-echoes-today-in-the-u-s/
Rick Steves’ The Story of Fascism in Europe, did a surprisingly good job;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JU1IVW6uqM0
Frontline; Trump’s Comeback;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VbdLehKFQY&pp=0gcJCfcAhR29_xXO
Anyone who supports an administration that has clearly stated they are above the law has abdicated any justification for being protected by it.
I totally agree. I think many people are legitimately angry about an unelected billionaire purposefully destroying our government and economy, but protesting Tesla Corp and destroying Tesla vehicles and dealerships is just stupid. Although he’s the figurehead of the company, and regardless of what he’s convinced the stockholders of, Musk has had little to do with the success of Tesla. He merely rode on the coattails of the founders and the talented engineers and hardworking people at the company and profited from billions in government handouts. If someone wants to sell or trade their Tesla because is Musk’s antics, then fine, but the destruction of property is wicked nonsense and shouldn’t be condoned by anyone.
P.S. – also, on aesthetic merits alone the CT is a horrific eyesore and a blight upon the landscape and I hope they all end up getting crushed or shredded so I never have to look at another one.
I gotta call bullshit. Protesting Tesla is the best way to hurt Musk that the common man has. Killing the stock price is the only direct way we have to get at Musk. Drain his money.
By all means! But don’t destroy the cars and dealerships that help hardworking Americans make a living.
Destroying their stock price will have the same impact. It sucks, but making a living supporting Musk in any form is problematic.
Ah, but destroying the stock price will have a much larger impact on Edolf.
I agree, but his minions will feel the impact either way.
Don’t destroy people’s cars but I have zero sympathy for any dealerships and the tesla ones are directly connected to tesla. Not saying I approve destroying them but I understand it.
Yeah, apparently when Musk bought Twitter he didn’t want to take out the cash out of his own wealth because he would have to pay taxes or some other fees so what he did as an end run around the taxes was to take out massive bank loans using his stock in Tesla as collateral. He’s in a pretty damn tough spot if and when it comes time for him to start paying back those loans if Tesla is tanking. So that’s why when Tesla’s stocks started slipping a couple weeks or so ago he had Trump shilling for Tesla with that embarrassing used-car-dealership-type display on the White House lawn with various Tesla products in an effort to pump the stocks back up.
So, yeah, protesting at Tesla dealerships is one of the best forms of activism currently available to us the people.
He isn’t the figurehead. He has a massive financial interest in the company. The more Tesla wins, the more money he gets to spread his vile ideology and bigotry. Supporting Tesla is supporting that ideology.
He owns 13%. That’s substantial, but not “massive” lol
Owning 13% of a publicly traded company as its CEO is massive and extremely uncommon.
13% of a $Tn company is massive.
I never said it was common. On scale, 13% of Tesla is a shit-ton of money. Yep, for sure.
On a macro view, 13% of anything isn’t all that much. So all this “I won’t buy a Tesla because I don’t wanna give Elon one penny!” nonsense, is just that.
It’s just a virtue signal bullshit statement, and that kinda sentiment is something that could lead to “real people like you and me” to lose their jobs.
It’s a terribly mean mindset to have, and the antithesis of everything else written, in regard to morality, that the commenters who write the above statement say otherwise.
If your DNA was 13% different from a human, you’d be a manatee.
13% ownership of a public company is massive. 13% ownership of a $tn company is massive. There’s no way it can be spun otherwise.
Let me get this straight: You don’t think 13% of a company with a $880B market cap reflects a significant financial stake. I truly hope you are never given responsibility for anything related to numbers or money.
It might be time to get a little less you.
Honestly Get Stoney is alright, he’s not just mindlessly posting pro Trump stuff. He’s usually at least open to talking and considering other viewpoints. I don’t always agree with him but if you ask him to elaborate he always does and he’ll have conversations in good faith, at least in my experience.
Thanks, bud! Some of these guys are so hyper-sensitive to the point that if someone says anything an iota off of their narrow view, they freak, lol.
It’s pretty strange to me that I can have differing stances on different subjects and that is considered “bad”, or some shit like that. Whatever, I say. What Ever! haha
Also, I left this page, but decided to come back and comment again because something you wrote bothers me a bit:
“…he’s not just mindlessly posting pro Trump stuff…”
First of all, that would be crazy to come to a car site and just post propaganda, regardless of the actual subject. So, no, I don’t do that, lol.
Secondly, even if I was a “Trump Guy”, that’s not a bad thing. I understand that basically everyone here (except for about a group of fingers and toes) are pretty hard core liberals. Which is fine. Good. The exchange of viewpoints is important. To exclude another viewpoint, in what amounts to a completely harmless and incognito sliver of the internet, is to be purposely daft.
No one here should want to be daft, but there appears that there are some here that have made that choice. Good luck to them on that, I suppose?
That’s it. Have a great day 🙂
I don’t just unilaterally hate Trump supporters. I’m certainly frustrated with them at the moment because their choices are making me and my loved ones’ lives worse, but there’s no way that tens of millions of people are all bad. I’m related to Trump supporters and I don’t hate them.
The culture warrior/conspiratorial/outright hateful/immune to discourse/bigoted side of them I’d rather not deal with. I think many of them will come to regret their actions and I’ll welcome them back when they’re ready, but I don’t think that’s happening as we speak. Maybe it is, I’d be happy if it was.
I’m trying to improve my own dialogue a bit to make it less off
-putting and more inviting of conversation, but there’s frustration is getting the better of me at times because it’s hard to be zen when your life is potentially going to be upended by an administration that doesn’t really care to try to understand the consequences of their actions. I actually don’t disagree that there are areas the government needs to be much less wasteful (looking at you, Pentagon) I just don’t think a clumsy, frat bro sledgehammer/WWE style approach is a good way of handling things.
Anyway here I think we have a mix of liberals and leftists. I’m firmly in the latter category. While I support liberal social causes for the most part they’re not my primary focus. The death of the middle class, the fact that we have worse wealth inequality than the Gilded Age, the absurd cost of living, the fact that healthcare and education can bankrupt you in this country, etc. are.
I honestly don’t really enjoy discourse with liberals. I wouldn’t say I dislike it on the level I dislike talking to a Q Anon type or something like that, but a lot of liberals and by extension most Democrats don’t “get it” in my opinion, if that makes sense. The biggest issue is far and away economic equality and it’s not particularly close…and that’s the main reason so many people who will be harmed by Trump’s policies lined up to vote for him. In the words of libertarian leaning left wing commentator Shoe On Head, “it’s the populism, sweetie”.
I actually don’t think the values of a lot of conservatives and leftists are all that far apart. There will have to be compromises of course, but what we want will be good for everyone. In a country this wealthy and resource rich I think everyone should have the right to healthcare, education, food, water, and a baseline quality of life that’s halfway decent.
It’s a little late for that part.
Also, are you trying to “cancel” me? Good luck with that one 😉
Not at all. I thought I played into your username nicely.
Musk isn’t doing politics, he was never elected and Doge (pronounced ‘dodgy’) is not a government or political agency. What he’s doing is subversion which is the opposite of politics. So I think it’s appropriate to be questioning Musk and opposing him by all means possible, including withholding of purchases and mockery.
You don’t think a government department is a part of the government?
Trump and Elon still aren’t gonna talk to you man
It’s a (renamed) government agency alright, but Musk, by the government’s own testament in court filings, isn’t running it. (Which I think was Kretzmann’s point.)
Except he is, by his own (and Senile Orange’s) admission.
So on the one hand, he’s not doing anything and doesn’t have the power to do it in the first place, and on the other hand, he’s got the power to send twenty-somethings into federal agencies and download all sorts of sensitive data onto insecure systems (or simply print hard copies) and do Lord knows what with it.
The only way to describe this “no I’m not/yes I am” behavior is to call it what it is – an undermining of the government. Congress and the courts are asleep at the wheel.
Ignoring the politics, to a degree the Cybertruck was never going to be a best seller. Most cars that have extreme styling seldom sell well. Mix that with the price increases, and the writing was on the wall (see DeLorean is an example).
The biggest issue (outside of the CEO) is that it’s a pickup truck (and a huge one!). Pickup truck buyers (for the most part) are fairly low key and utilitarian people who want a useful box with a cargo box on the back. Trucks that don’t look like a truck or don’t do stereotypical truck things aren’t going to be best sellers. This is why Tacomas outsell Ridgelines; why Mavericks outsell Santa Cruzes.
Tesla low key dropped the ball by not making a compelling-looking truck (and making it REAL Flashy). The fashion trumps (pun intended) the form. It’s a vehicle for people who are flashy, into Halo, or are influencers. This is a really narrow market.
It is frustrating that Tesla can make some of the best EV’s in the business, but couldn’t make a decent truck.
You really hit the nail on the head Thomas. I genuinely don’t think most people give a shit about the political leanings of the people running car companies and there are a total of 0 corporations that have skeleton free closets. The issue is that Musk has decided EVERYONE needs to know his political leanings and is visibly meddling in a lot of shit he’s unqualified to be meddling in and making the lives of most Americans worse as a result.
This is who he’s always been if you’ve been paying attention closely, but something changed in the last few years that made him decide he needs to shove it down everyone’s throats 24/7/365. It’s probably a combination of all the drugs he does and the fact that he’s a megalomaniac who’s profoundly mentally ill so it was only a matter of time until the mask came off.
For ghouls like Elon there’s no such thing as enough. They always have to have the most, life is just a giant scoreboard to them, and they will literally never be satisfied. Elon is just a sad, wholly unhappy guy who’s completely ruled by his own insecurities…because let’s be real here, deep down (maybe even subconsciously) there’s a little piece of him that knows he isn’t particularly smart and that no one has ever truly liked him or found him funny.
That’s literally all he wants. He wants people to like him and he wants people to think he’s funny. No one actually likes Elon the person because he’s a sociopathic jackass of a human being. All of his allies are people he buys and/or blackmails. He’s not that different from Trump on that front-the difference is people actually like Trump and find him funny. Elon clearly wants to be Trump so badly it’s pathetic.
He’s really just your run of the mill insecure male sociopath…he just happens to have billions of dollars to try to live out his childish fantasies in front of all of us. But the thing about Elon that always makes me giggle is that he’s NEVER going to have what he wants. You can’t buy true friends. You can’t buy true love. You can’t make a loving family by just putting your man juice in a bunch of vials and paying people to have your babies…and buying Twitter to shove your shitty memes and jokes down everyone’s throats isn’t going to make you funny.
At the end of the day he’s just a pathetic loser, and if he didn’t feel the need to throw a giant tantrum about it in public all day everyday he’d still be selling lots of cars…because the products his company came up with are still competitive. But he can’t bring himself to do that. All of this could be avoided if he’d just get some damn therapy and take it seriously…but for men like this therapy is the ultimate sign of weakness and they’d rather load up on testosterone supplements, assorted uppers, fascism, and conspiracy theories that explain why everyone else is wrong rather than just deal with their own shit.
In a lot of cases it’s sad. With Musk it’s hilarious, because he’s been so terrible to so many people for so long that it’s karma in action. He will never be in on the joke because he IS the joke.
Perfection in comment form.
Wow, that’s beautiful prose!
ALL
IS
SAID
I recall something from a pathetic inspirational children’s book he “wrote” talking about how brave he was for dealing with bullies and one of them even pushed him down the stairs! Except in an interview with his dad, papa musk revealed that elon was making fun of the kid’s parents for being either divorced or dead, and when the kid shoved him the stairs even his dad was like “had that coming”
Oh, yes, Elon was actually bullying a classmate whose father had committed suicide and calling the classmate’s deceased father names until the classmate had had enough and shoved Elon down some stairs which resulted in Elon going to the hospital; apparently the school authorities and the police were much more sympathetic to the beleaguered classmate than they were to Elon once they found out the circumstances.
I know that this will never be comment of the day (totally fair lol) but it is to me.
It should be
As a rule, we don’t nominate political comments for COTD, but my gosh, Nsane’s comment won my heart.
Winning your heart means far more than winning COTD!
Oh, I TOTALLY understand why. It’s not worth it worth a number of reasons.
You are on a goddamn roll lately. I wish were in a time and place where it didn’t have to be such an angry roll, but this the time and place we’re in and you know what the say: we don’t get no tolls, we don’t eat no rolls.
“You’ve been in the sacramental wine again, haven’t you?”
I grew up with multiple dark triads and that is it exactly. These tough-acting, but hopelessly fragile humanoids have black holes in place of souls. Lacking self awareness to recognize that they’re the problem and the grit to face it and work on it, all they can do is get satisfaction by pulling in and destroying everyone else within their event horizon and they cannot be satiated or changed. Unfortunately for all of us, the money muskrat inherited and weaseled his way into has afforded him quite the gravity.
I saw a CT wrapped in flat black. It had damage to both rear quarter panels, like they brushed a building or something.
I also thought it was just plain ugly…
I wish people would stop calling what Trump and Musk are doing “political”. It’s more like an all-out war on commoners, which isn’t political at all.
We are in a full blown class war at this point and things are going to get much worse before they get better
Agreed. It’s that sort of meekness that let this grow and grow, while congresspeople strongly condemn this and are deeply concerned by that.
Looking purely at the vehicle itself, I don’t hate the Cybertruck. I actually find the looks appealing in the sea of sameness that is the US vehicle market. I asked my kids without context what they thought of it, and they thought it looked cool, saying their classmates like them too. I find it super ironic that so many people complain about all cars looking the same these days, then turn around and bash any automaker who tries something new.
I also like the power export capabilities to serve as my standby home power source, with Ford being the only other EV truck at launch to offer that. Now the Chevy EV truck is out with that, but Rivian still hasn’t done it.
If it was $50-60k like it was supposed to be, I’d probably have bought one at launch.
Now looking at the greater picture of Tesla and Musk, coupled with the now well-documented quality issues and hopelessness offroad, you couldn’t pay me to take one.
In just about any other case I’d have to respect any company that went ahead and gave us a car that’s so goddamn weird and outside the box…but in this case I cannot.
If it launched an inflation adjusted $40k for the base RWD, these things would be selling like crazy. Enough people like the looks that there will always be a market at a low enough price.
The Musk/Trump political drama will eventually pass, but the build quality issues may be here to stay. Unless they do a complete exterior redesign, I don’t see how they can eliminate all the sharp edges or improve the tolerances enough to make those large, flat planes good good 100% of the time.
What do you mean? The cybertruck already has sub-10-micron tolerances!
https://www.thedrive.com/news/musk-demands-sub-10-micron-accuracy-for-tesla-cybertruck-build-quality-in-leaked-email
(Jk)
New and different != good. I’d love to see something new. I’d love a supercar that isn’t a wedge, top speed be damned. I’d love a truck that doesn’t have 6 grills and a tailgate height of 69 inches. There are new things that are ugly, just like there were old things that are ugly. I’ll bash ugly – when it’s intentional, when it destroys function, when it’s clearly contradictory to the art of design and the utility of a vehicle – whenever I see it.
The Cybertruck is fuckugly, it’s hateful to drivers, to pedestrians, to people that want to use the bed, or shift gears. And now it’s a shittily built stainless steel MAGA codpiece to boot.
In a Q3 2023 earnings call, Musk predicted CT sales would top out at 250k /year, and they’d reach that production capacity in 2025. Initial line capacity of 125k
https://cleantechnica.com/2024/02/07/can-tesla-cybertruck-reach-400000-sales-a-year/
Talk about missing your forecast.
I was in denial for a LONG time that they’d actually build it. It didn’t – still doesn’t – make sense. But kinda figured once they did that it would be a niche vehicle that would sell similarly to the Model S…maybe less. I just don’t think there are any other examples of a vehicle that is THIS different from the norm selling like a mainstream vehicle. In the world of pickups, it was always destined to be more Blackwood, (much) less F-150.
Projecting 100’s of thousands in sales was a laugh WAY before recent events…
Musk doesn’t project sales numbers or delivery dates in the normal sense of business projections. He just states as facts, promises, or projections his off the cuff wishes based on the silicon valley practice of grossly unrealistic deadlines.
I had some Cybertruck apologist dig up an old comment where I said the Cybertruck would never reach production status and try to give me grief about it, but based on the quality of the ones they’ve shipped I would argue it never did. They just sold whatever crap they could bolt together. They’re at best early engineering prototypes at any other company. Even the most notoriously quality-averse car companies would blush at shipping something with this many problems.
jeremy_clarkson_oh_no_anyway.gif
I always pretend I am going to puke when I see a cybertruck and my kids started doing the same lol
I read a story about a guy who was dropping his kid off at school in his Cybertruck and all the kids were pointing and laughing at it, then his kid got out and started pointing and laughing along with all the other kids. While most stories on the internet are fake, I choose to believe this one actually happened.
My daughter saw one for the first time in CT last summer, and pointed at it (as it was driving towards us in a parking lot, so I assume the driver saw) and laughed.
“Dad what is that thing? It’s all lines and points and it’s all WRONG. *Buzzer mouth noise*”
She’s 6. And very much correct.
Calgon, take me away.
I need to find the wormhole to a more sane reality.
Even without Musk’s foray into politics, this was sort of always bound to happen. It’s obviously a very, very niche vehicle- and one that does not meet its original range and price targets – sales were going to drop off once everyone who wanted one had one. The overly optimistic sales forecasts Tesla made, which seemed to be based on no/low risk early reservations, were always complete bullshit
If anything, the political side journey probably drummed up a few more “own the libs” sales than the Cybertruck would have made on its own merit. Without the run as a Nazi trophy piece, it would have just been met with apathy for the past several months.
Yah, a shit truck has a limited market. Ask Subaru how well baja sales are rolling and you can guess the market for 4dr w minimal bed cars are.
If there was a new Baja it would almost certainly sell like hotcakes. Maverick sales are through the roof.
While Santa Cruz ones sales are not, it’s gotta be well priced more than anything, so I don’t know whether Subaru would pull it off or not.
Agreed, the Santa Cruz is much more expensive, looks funky/not like a truck, and made by a manufacturer that isn’t known for trucks. I think Subaru would struggle to pull off a truck too.
Unfortunately the Santa Cruz is just a lousy product that really only has one thing going for it, which is its funkiness. The gas mileage sucks and there’s no hybrid option, the backseats are not big enough for adults, the bed is short, and it’s too damn expensive. I also have no idea why they saddled it with a damn DCT.
I have the same DCT in a different state of tune in my car and it’s great for spirited driving and basically nothing else. It’s super rough at low speeds. It’ll bang off shifts when driving hard at near PDK speeds but no one buying a trucklet is going to drive it like an N product.
You have to get an amazing deal on one or really love the styling for it to make sense. Unfortunately I think it’s a product that would’ve been well received 5 years before it launched but it doesn’t have a place in today’s market.
Just picked up a 25 Mav Lariat AWD Hybrid with 4 K towing. I purchased it for the capabilities/performance/efficiency not the looks. The Santacruz was always my 2nd choice but for some dumb reason it’s not available as a hybrid, or better yet, a plug-in hybrid. If it would have been offered with a very efficient plug in hybrid power option like its stable mates along with some decent towing (2.5-3K would be enough) I would have jumped on it. It has AWD and has a much better warranty than Ford’s.
Its’ not the styling that keeping small truck buyers away… it’s the inefficient powertrain compared to the hybrid Mav (I’m seeing around 40 mpg in town and the Mav has a 1,500 lb load capacity).
Maybe in a couple of years they’ll offer a true EREV like the upcoming Scout and/or perhaps Ford will debut an updated plug in / EREV Maverick or Ranger… but for right now, the Mav offers the best combination of small size and truck stuff.
Those aren’t comparable. The maverick is a pickup truck that happens to be smaller. The Baja was an outback wagon with the top sliced off. It’s a car, not a truck, and it has the utility of one, just like the Santa Cruz.
The Maverick is the same kind of vehicle as the old Tacoma, Mazda or VW trucks, etc.
The Baja and Santa Cruz are like rounded off El Caminos.
Ehhh, I wouldn’t say it’s closer to something like a Mazda B2000. If anything, it is closer to the Baja, being a unibody vehicle derived from an existing wagonish/crossoverish thing. In Subaru’s case, it was the Outback, and in Ford’s case it was the Escape.
But it does have exceptionally trucky styling, which counts for a lot in this market.
Yeah, I wouldn’t compare this to the Baja. The Baja was just ahead of its time. Look how well the Ridgeline, Maverick, and Santa Cruz are selling. If Subaru brought back the Baja using the new Outback platform and sold it around the same as an Outback, it would enjoy a healthy market.
Plus, the Cybertruck bed is a full 1.5′ longer than the Rivian R1T, and I see Rivians everywhere.
The Cybertruck sucks, but nobody is cross shopping it with the Maverick or Santa Cruz.
Actually if you are looking for a fuel-efficient/”green” truck there’s some overlap with a Hybrid Mav (actually goes all electric sometimes). I have a Mav. There’s no way I’d pay a penny for a ClusterTruck and if you gave me one for free I’d sell it and send the money to Astronaut Kelly just to piss off Muskkk
You referring to the guy who sold his electric car and replaced it with 2 Chevy Tahoes?
I think there is a use case for a 4-door small truck with a small bed, but only if it has decent towing capacity (5k+ pounds) Anyone who trailers their boat would be a good customer – nobody want wet stuff in their cabin, and the sight lines for towing should be better with a bed instead of a box on the backend.