What If Car Companies Actually Tried To Sell Their Electric Cars?

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I love putting together the monthly electric car sales reports. I love statistics, I love spreadsheets, I love charts, and I love electric cars. But there’s one thing that frustrates me every time — looking at the sales of electric cars that are “on the market” but available almost nowhere.

Sales of the Nissan LEAF and Tesla Model S crush the sales of other 100% electric cars. But there are several electric cars “on the market” that are really just available in a few places. I’m sure the Fiat 500e and Chevy Spark EV would sell really well if they were actually being mass-manufactured and sold in more markets than I have fingers on my right hand. They both cost less than the average new car, will save you a ton of money in the long run, drive better than their gasmobile siblings, have gotten great reviews, help to make your life simpler, help to cut more pollution out of your life, and can save you a lot of time. Aside from those two, the RAV4 would also probably see good sales, and the Honda Fit EV might — I know many Honda lovers are interested in the car.

On my part, it would be cool to see some actual competition every month in this arena, but my concern is also about much more. Two electric car models available nationwide can only have a minimal impact. A dozen or so electric car models would make a huge difference in regards to bringing greater awareness to the simple fact that electric cars are even on the market (a huge problem right now is lack of awareness). Furthermore, no car is perfect for everyone. People have allegiances to different brands and have different tastes and needs.

This is all obvious, but the issue is that we talk about electric car sales, we talk about consumer attitudes to electric cars, we talk about EV charging stations, etc, but consistently without pointing out that almost all of the electric cars “on the market” aren’t really on the market for most people. And they should be!

Anyway, that’s my rant of the day. In kinder terms, I guess I could say something like, “if you build it, they will come.” But I’m more driven to say it like this: Fiat, GM, Honda, and Toyota, sell your freakin’ electric cars nationwide!


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Zachary Shahan

Zach is tryin' to help society help itself one word at a time. He spends most of his time here on CleanTechnica as its director, chief editor, and CEO. Zach is recognized globally as an electric vehicle, solar energy, and energy storage expert. He has presented about cleantech at conferences in India, the UAE, Ukraine, Poland, Germany, the Netherlands, the USA, Canada, and Curaçao. Zach has long-term investments in Tesla [TSLA], NIO [NIO], Xpeng [XPEV], Ford [F], ChargePoint [CHPT], Amazon [AMZN], Piedmont Lithium [PLL], Lithium Americas [LAC], Albemarle Corporation [ALB], Nouveau Monde Graphite [NMGRF], Talon Metals [TLOFF], Arclight Clean Transition Corp [ACTC], and Starbucks [SBUX]. But he does not offer (explicitly or implicitly) investment advice of any sort.

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