ford-gm-mercedes-come-clean-on-ev-demand-weakness

alarmguy said:
Sometimes we ignore the income levels of the majority of the country AND not only that but those responsible to live within their means and not take out giant loans on a depreciating asset. Meaning I don want to discount wealthy people buying less expensive cars, many wealthy people consider a car to get from A to B . ... (though not in BITOG)

Honestly between a 2024 or 2025 for a second car that does nothing more than sit at our house almost everyday of the week except when my wife might run to a local store or even I take the car for a short run instead of my SUV or my Harley Road King.

A Chevy Bolt with taxpayer money might be a good choice OR what I consider an incredible deal and sales are through the roof is the GM Trax.
https://gmauthority.com/blog/2023/04/here-is-gms-expected-2024-chevy-trax-sales-mix/
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I definitely consider it mostly to get from A to B, but I would like a bit of pizzazz. 😂

I don't have space with my current setup to have an additional 3rd car which is one more than we have drivers right now, but even if I did I'm not sure I could find the need in it either.

More of a financial conversation than anything, but I think it's fair to say some of the reason why prices are so insane is because we can just take out a loan for a vehicle and a lot of people do just that. If we all decided to save until we could buy it, that might make a change on how prices increase and inflation in general. I know I could qualify for a really stupid big loan on a crazy expensive vehicle, but I like driving a slightly older VW instead of dreading a car payment if I had a bad month.
 
Another round up of 2022 cost data.

7E04C590-19B1-4802-B30D-EF79DF86AA48.webp
 
Torrid said:
All cars have slowed in sales. Interest rates suck and overall most cars are more expensive than they had been.

You’re just one of those people looking to rile people up. It’s a poor quality to have.
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It's blatant confirmation bias. There's a lot of it around here, especially in this EV forum. But certainly not limited to EVs, we longtime members know that people sometimes join this forum uneducated about oil and then proceed to say all manner of things about oils in general. Things like "0w40 is too thin, I'd rather use 5w30". Some figure it out, some don't, some get banned, some are just annoying longterm fixtures that don't cross the line and thusly don't get banned. Life is like a box of chocolates.
 
dogememe said:
Sales will be up in 2024. The $7500 down payment assistance as it should be called is a big deal. Could even get people out of an upside down car loan on their existing car.

Also keep in mind some people are holding out for more options. Equinox EV comes to mind. It would sell well now if it was available.
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Yes, not having to deal with my HR department to lower my paycheck withholding for the rest of the calendar year is a big win for this subsidy.
 
dnewton3 said:
For Mercedes, I cannot make a rationale comment because I don't know much about their demographic.

For Ford and GM, it's simple. The macro market demands big vehicles with ICE drivetrains. Why invest huge money in a reasonably small EV market niche when they can pump out trucks/suvs which command good profit margins with existing resources (engineering, development, production) already in place? Mass market EV acceptance is way off in the future. It doesn't make sense to forego the big money on the table now for the "what if ..." possibilities of the future.

The Big Three have always focused on the present and not so much deep into the future. I'm not saying it's right or wrong; it's just the way they are.
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If Telsa can sell the Cybertruck at prices similar to what Ford/Chevy/Ram/Toyota sell their trucks, it could take a bite out of sales. With all these trucks out here in the $70-$100K range, this is the market I personally think is ripe for the picking for EV trucks.

BUT, Tesla or whomever really needs to come up with an EV truck that can tow a reasonably large trailer for 200+ miles between charges, for that to happen. Maybe the Silverado EV can do it, I've seen some YT reviews where they towed over 200mi. Let's see what the production truck does.
 
Torrid said:
I had this thought before. It’s just gone. They’ve decided it’s easier to just make it all electronic and program it. At this point a hand crank window is more complicated to manufacture than an electric one since they’re in everything. Manual transmissions are down to nearly all enthusiast cars only and even those have screens for gauges now.
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There is some truth to this. Features are now unlocked by software, already, on certain models. It is more efficient to assemble something where every part is exactly the same.
 
alarmguy said:
Some of todays news is calling the EV the next Edsel as demand slacks, production cutbacks ___
Not that I am a media believer and think EVs have their place, I always said they will never take over the USA market and I mean never take it over unless something new comes along besides a batter operated EV.

Im not so sure. The "overall most cars" is a poor statement, nothing comes close to the inflated cost of an EV.
Im not a big media person, but the tide IS starting to change as they all scramble to "cover" themselves from their wild predictions that battery powered cars will overtake the ICE

https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/ev-market-next-big-flop-economist
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Sorry to have to say it, but consider the source...
 
BMWTurboDzl said:
IOW..Consumers aren't buying at the prices they want to sell at.

High interest rates along with the fact that these automakers are unable to build an EV at anything but the most luxurious trim levels. They've abandoned the affordability segment to VW, Hyundai/KIA.
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absolutely true, and even with those brands there's not that much under $30K when you look at an actual dealer lot.

The Kia dealer nearest my takes $4K markup on every new car, calls it the protection package or something. I have owned 3 Korean cars but I won't be giving them additional markup over sticker in this lifetime.
 
Brons2 said:
The new Trax is bigger than the old penalty box, and starts at $21,495.
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It's a massive improvement. I had to stop to see what it was when I was just driving through a parking lot. I was surprised how much it seems to be pushing up on the Blazer's territory, but if the Blazer is going all EV then it completely makes sense. We had a rental Trax when we were waiting for our Tesla to show up and we needed a second car when I went out of town on business. It was horribly cheap feeling which wasn't great because it was an LT with leather. This new one is light years ahead of the previous one.
 
millerbl00 said:
When the new battery technology (solid state) comes things will turn around. But not till then..
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2025 was the preliminary ssb production, and well toyota delivered on that promised earlier by delivering ssbs in their tacoma bluetooth speaker.

We shall see how fast ssb starts replacing their current lithium batteries in their hybrid lineup
 
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