I just experienced the craziest new-car reveal ever. Slate, a new company that — according to a recent article by Tech Crunch — has been secretively engineering a $25,000-ish electric vehicle using funding from Jeff Bezos and other investors, just showed off its new car by hiding it in plain sight. The company put an absolutely absurd wrap on its new SUV and then just parked the SUV on the side of a trendy street in Venice, California, with zero information. No sign, no representative, no press release — just a car that has scores of pedestrians craning their necks wondering: “What the?!” I just drove to Venice; here’s what I saw.
This is not how new-car debuts happen. Automakers are usually obsessed with “messaging.” They spend tens of thousands of dollars hiring photographers to make sure the perfect photos are released ahead of a debut, they make sure they invite the “right” journalists to the reveal event, they stage the cars just so, and they not only send out press releases to ensure the brand is received is a very particular way, but they have representatives at the reveal event say all sorts of brand-ish things (words like s”dynamism” and “soul” are often used) to make you all think the car is maximally cool.
Slate didn’t do that. Slate went wacky and just showed the car off by dropping a design buck on the side of Abbot Kinney Boulevard, a popular shopping destination in always-trendy Venice. And to make sure people pay attention to this mystery machine, Slate has wrapped the car in an extremely strange livery for a fake company that I guess drives your baby around on the car’s roof until the baby falls asleep?
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“Cryshare” in the name of the clearly-fake company, with the message on the back window reading: “When baby drives you crazy, we drive them to sleep.” The baby seats on the roof had more than just a few pedestrians scratching their heads as took these photos.
The binkies/pacifies on the B-pillar and the huge one on the front of the car are bizarre.
I asked a few people about what they thought, and they like the overall shape. “A two-door SUV, count me in!” is (approximately) what one gentleman told me as he asked what I was taking photos of. Sadly, I couldn’t tell him everything I knew, since I’m under a strict NDA, but what I could tell him is that this is the new Slate!
We’ve already written about spy shots of a pickup truck version, and the reason why I even drove to Venice is because this Reddit thread in the “whatisthiscar” community showed a similarly-wackily-wrapped coupe-ish SUV (with an absurd cat-therapist livery!):
Saw this in a tiktok ad, can yall tell what it is??
byu/tough_stough inwhatisthiscar
So now we’ve seen a truck, a coupe-ish SUV, and this boxy one that looks a lot like a Land Rover Defender in profile.
It looks cool, and most importantly, the way this brand new company just showed off its first vehicle has to be the boldest, wackiest thing I’ve seen in my career — I’m here for it!
By the way, those of you who know me are probably wondering if I crawled underneath; of course I did! What I saw were some BFG all-terrains and what looks to clearly be a non-functioning design-buck with no powertrain or real suspension.
Still, this is approximately what you can expect the new Slate to look like, so get excited! The full reveal is coming in just a few days on April 24, and while I can’t tell you anything right now, what I can say is this: Prepare to have your minds blown.
This vehicle is unlike any new vehicle I’ve ever seen not just in my decade as a car journalist, but in my entire lifetime. April 24; get excited!
All Photos: David Tracy
So many haters on here this morning, lol. Not one person here knows any real details about it, except for DT (and, no doubt, the rest of the staff).
If DT says to be exited, you probably should be. In the meantime, chill out 😉
Sheesh.
Yeah, you gotta be excited about this. Just trust me. This is like Scout levels of excitement (I’d rather have the Scout than the Slate, but the Slate is definitely wilder overall).
Gotta ask, are you excited because you know they aren’t going to use any Zinc in the production?
Do you know if any examples that are more than a concept car???
The three examples don’t have any mechanical parts underneath…
Tech Crunch is reporting that you can change the rear of the truck for your wishes like the old Pulsar NX: sloped back, big cap, pickup. Dunno if that will make up for the mechanical stuff
Hey… I’m excited! I’m excited to see how big of a flop this will be!
I’m optimistic, but cautious. I REALLY WANT there to be an ACTUAL REAL BUYABLE $25K EV with some room inside and a bit of personality (it doesn’t need to be any faster than an equivalent gas vehicle, and a base range of 200 miles is enough, but that’s JMHO). Of course, I’d be happier if Buffet rather than Bezos were putting up some of the development dollars, but you know we can’t have nice things.
The ‘coupe’ SUV will probably sell the most, but it seems ludicrous (to me) to willingly lose all that storage space in the back, so I’d pick the Land Rover Disco-looking one with the square back, so I can get furniture in the back and still be able to close the hatch. The pickup is nice too: I’m into the boxy, less-adorned look. I hope they make other choices in favor of simplicity (even if it’s really just to reduce cost) and avoid EV geegaws like pop-out door handles, glove boxes opened via the touch screen, etc…) and just make a simple car that’s good at being a car, rather than make something that’s going to by a royal PITA to fix 15 years later.
I hope it comes to market, and I pray that they somehow manage to sell direct to buyers so MSRP is what you pay, instead of greedy dealers and flippers marking all of the cars up by $10K or more for the first few years. THAT ALONE (the manufacturer selling directly to buyers at an agreed price w/o dealership hassles/financing/add-on hardsells) would engender SO MUCH goodwill towards Slate, that it would probably offset some of the bad taste in my mouth from giving Bezos more of my money when he’s clearly such a tool.
Fingers crossed but not holding my breath.
Those tires aren’t gonna help any baby fall asleep.
I’m getting a lot of Bronco Sport in this design… have to wonder if Ford is already pouring over what they can see for a lawsuit.
The tires won’t help the baby go to sleep, but what I see from the suspension implies the baby would be knocked out cold by the first speed bump.
(yes, I know it’s only a model).
Camelot! https://youtu.be/SQCArh_R9dY?feature=shared
I hope they don’t brick it like they did with older, non subscription enabled Amazon products when they decided to enshittify it by making a subscription on top of Prime mandatory. “Oh, you want to keep that 300 mile range? That’ll be $10 a month.”
I mean, it’s one way to get people into the low cost version, innit?
Ok I liked the truck in theory as that’s all we have seen so far. If this becomes available at ~$25k, I would be willing to jump in on trying out an EV. This would be the perfect little work vehicle for me. Closed in back to keep tools/product secure and from what I remember of the other articles, decent range. Yeah it might not make the long trips from Atlanta to south Florida but for all my local stuff, it would be pretty darn good. Can charge at home and be set.
My wife can order it on Amazon have it delivered to our house. Jeff Bezos maybe on to something here.
Amazon sells Hyundais that way, at least here in Indiana. Although they’re just brokering dealer inventory, similar to the Costco buying program.
I thought we’d be talking about that sweet 64-66 C10 pickup.
This kind of reminds me of what a company called Alpha is doing, but with Bezos Slate is likely going to have a better chance.
Agree, but neither likely to hit $25,000 target. I give a Bezos backed company about 99% better odds than Alpha at making it to market. I think Amazon still owns about 17% of Rivian, so who know, might get some help there as well. Alpha is mostly crowd sourced with hundreds of small investors. I love their designs, but mostly because they are throwbacks to a simpler time in transportation. Anyone else could do that if they chose to do so, and everyone else is much further along in a VERY crowded EV space. I’m rooting for Slate, because the alternative is BYD making a car/truck so cheap that it is still $25000 even with 150% tariffs. I can see that happening just to wreck domestic EVs forever.
Pretty sure Alpha is still scheduled to hit the market approximately 4 months after Elio
IF this comes to market it will be $50,000. Justsayn’
Yeah, but they’ll waive destination with Prime.
That in-garage delivery finally makes sense!
The one thing worth letting a stranger into my garage for
Gold.
I’m excited to see this, everything so far looks really cool.
“This vehicle is unlike any new vehicle I’ve ever seen not just in my decade as a car journalist, but in my entire lifetime. April 24; get excited!”
April Fools??
I don’t like Bezos but he’s investing in what looks to be a genuinely appealing product here. If the bar to electric vehicle entry is lowered and the resulting vehicle isn’t a complete penalty box, there isn’t much downside here other than someone who already has more money than anyone should ever have having even more.
“. . . there isn’t much downside here other than someone who already has more money than anyone should ever have having even more.”
Well, the good news for you is that starting a car company is a horrible investment. All the morons that keep Tesla propped-up have distorted that fact, but even its time seems up. I’m old enough to remember the best way to end up with a small fortune in the auto industry being starting with a large one, with Mosler, Vector, and many others. If Bezos wants to add a competitor to try to keep prices down in the face of insane tariffs then great, and hopefully he has as much luck avoiding the UAW as he has the taxpayer parasite Teamsters.
Jeff must be trying to become Elon, investing in car startups. Let’s see how that works out for him.
At least this looks better than the Cybertruck, almost a Bronco II vibe to it. Then again, Tesla’s first car looked good too.
Elon invested in an existing product (Tesla) and then kind of took it over, whereas Bezos is working from a clean slate. I’m assuming this is the origin of the name.
Clean Slate. I see what you did there
I instantly went to Bronco II as well.
But wider. I like the look.
Yeah, because it was a Lotus. All the other ones, not so much.
The early Model S was alright, before they gave it the same grille shape with no grille face they all have now.
Bezos aside, I really like the design and the marketing is brilliant. The baby seats on the roof are *chef’s kiss*
Hats off to them for a real URL too
Hopefully they make something (I could stop there, but…) that isn’t another goddamn SUV. Please do a minivan, or a car.
Well, shit, this is an awesome design, but I cannot support anything that Bezos invests in. Fuck that guy. Awesome truck, but fuck that guy.
Where should we draw the line? Scaringe seems ok, no? But then he took Saudi money, and Bezos money. Which degree of separation becomes acceptable because we only got seven of them. Discuss.
One degree for direct culpability, two for parking lot harassment.
I draw the line at all of them as much as possible; when it comes to cars it’s very easy actually; I just don’t buy new cars, and probably never will, even if I can afford it.
Well my point was larger. Food companies, packaging, fashion, real estate, telcos etc are mostly run by assholes in various degrees. I feel your pain, just not sure how to handle because sometimes there’s good babies in that bath water.
I understand this, and you do what you can. I don’t go to certain fast food restaurants or shop at some chains because I have qualms with their politics, so I try to get informed on alternatives I consider less harmful. I try to not shop online, and I refuse to shop from amazon (don’t even have an amazon account, or subscribe to any of their services). But like I said, you do what you can. I need a phone plan, and all providers where I live suck. I’m not just going to not have a phone; I try to understand which one sucks less and go with it. But the tech that allows me to use those services will always be second hand. I can’t even imagine myself ever buying a brand new phone/computer/tv again – especially as someone who prefers macOS but cannot stand Apple. So, no new hardware or app store purchases, but that won’t stop me from using what I need to use from Apple – I just try to not make direct contributions.
On a broader sense, I’m lucky that I can still get lots of cheap, locally sourced stuff, especially fresh groceries, but also stuff like detergents, soap, toohpaste, and whatnot. For instance, there’s a small company nearby making less harmful detergents at a semi-industrial scale and selling to the public for cheaper than any name brand, without any compromise on quality, so I buy that. Clothes get patched up whenever possible. Shoes are used until they fall apart. That sort of thing. I’m not fooling myself into thinking I’m making a huge impact in the grand scheme of things, but I’m sure I can affect change at a smaller scale by discussing these ideas. A lot of my friends now buy detergents at the same place as I do because I pointed them to an alternative.
Should we assume you will only support new car companies started by poor people? That is going to be a pretty short list.
I don’t really support any car companies. I prefer state owned car companies, but that’s as far as I go re: companies themselves. My favourite state owned carmaker is pre-1992 Renault. The Big Three during the 2008 crisis are a closed second, but just for the absurdity of a bailout without ownership reverting to the state – now, those are some companies that for a while were partly owned by A WHOLE LOT of poor peple.
Hopefully you’re only travelling by foot, if that sort of purity test is your bar for acceptability.
I do like to ride a bike to places, but I’m comfortable just not buying new cars, thanks. No need to undercut myself in order to protest the only bad minority.
Stylistically, it reminds me of the new Scout and a Bronco Sport in the front and an old Bronco II from the B pillar back. A Scronco. Scale isn’t clear from the photos, but it could be very interesting if smaller than existing SUVs in US. I may have missed it in the write up, but I wonder if a pickup version is planned (or if the top comes off)?
there will be a pickup, those pics were out first
dear god, if the hard top comes off, it’s going to be bananas and they will sell like hotcakes
The front end looks like a Bronco Sport. The sides look like the 83-92 Ranger/Bronco II. The taillights look like the first generation Bronco’s. And the roof is reminiscent of the first generation Bronco too. What are the chances Ford’s lawyers are warming up their cease and desist letters?
zero
Mad that Muskrat’s Swasticars are topping every “do not buy” list, here comes Captain Pissbottle with a new contender, the Bezosmobile!
I don’t care if one of these things is a Miata shooting brake, I’m not buying a car from modern day robber-baron Jeff Bozo.
thanks for the take
We’ve all seen the press gangs roaming neighborhoods grabbing peasants and shipping them off to the Amazon warehouses to labor.
they almost got me but I run fast
If it’s roughly the size of a current Jimny but with bigger front doors, and uses off-the-shelf widely available parts (plausible with the price tag) I might be genuinely interested.
It looks a lot bigger than a Jimny.
Based on those last four photos – We now know how these TechBros are able to get their vehicles to cost only $25K….
You might want to google what a vehicle buck, or design buck, is.
You might want to google “humor” and “irony”
no, see a joke is easy to tell that it’s a joke, which yours was not
Sorry that you need rimshots to know when to laugh.
when jokes are funny, it’s actually quite easy to do so
As for the rest of those who want that $25k SUV, the cameras and live mics inside will always be streaming your every action and location on Prime Video, the disclosures and NDAs flashed on the screens inside will need legal counsel to even remotely understand, and the most expensive option (priced at another $25k, btw) will be the one to turn off the data collection functions, at least the ones we know about…
Fascist Jeff Bezos being in any way involved (even just making a buck) is the worst thing about this and kills any potential joy.
I totally get your argument, and your not wrong. But at the same time, it seems like most automakers have been concentrating on making high priced large vehicles. I wouldn’t begrudge someone trying to save a couple dollars by getting a small, practical and extremely affordable option. It’s not like GM, Ford, or any other major automaker is ethically much better than Bezos, and at the very least, at least it ain’t Musk. Plus, Re:Build is a major driver behind trying to reinvigorate US manufacturing, and not in the MAGA way.
So I’m not ready to throw away all hope for this just because of Bezos. But I’m not going to forget that he’s largely behind it.
great points. We all forget that corporate America is not a collection of angels
Not only that, but being able to completely discredit an entry level offering that occupies a relatively niche space, simply because a single guy is involved, is a privilege. If you don’t have a ton of money, that alone makes this vehicle extremely compelling. If you don’t have a ton of money and need something that this specific vehicle offers, it’s not like there are loads of other choices out there (even ignoring the ethics of potential companies).
I mean you could buy from the real once-Fascists VW and Porsche, the old school wannabees, Ford, or the new school Tesla.
There are worse things in the world than being rich, and I challenge you to find any modern ultra wealthy that doesn’t have closets of douche behaviour to be vilified for.
Automakers don’t have control of the messaging around a new vehicle for very long. May as well release the vehicle to the public and see how it’s received.
I have never been a fan of modern marketing, and this seems a lot more honest to me. The roof rack of child seats makes me smile.
I am now curious about these vehicles, and will stay tuned for more information.
This could be in a William Gibson novel.
In a ‘this would give Kayce Pollard hives’ sort of way?