# Tesla reverses course again - raising prices, leaving some stores open



## Golden Gate

Just... wow.... I'm speechless.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/news/us...close-most-showrooms-13678679.php?src=hp_totn


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## $ Trillion Musk

Not a good image for Tesla. As an investor, I’m disturbed by the seemingly rash decisions that must be taking place behind the scenes. Plus, I’m sure there are going to be a lot of disgruntled and distressed employees knowing they might be laid off in the near future.


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## webdriverguy

$ Trillion Musk said:


> Not a good image for Tesla. As an investor, I'm disturbed by the seemingly rash decisions that must be taking place behind the scenes. Plus, I'm sure there are going to be a lot of disgruntled and distressed employees knowing they might be laid off in the near future.


Yes agree this is not good


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## Love

I see a connection between this move and the overwhelming demand for the Standard Range Model 3 (Tesla has already adjusted their estimated delivery for them to 8 weeks!) 
I think even Tesla underestimated the amount of people looking to buy the SR 3, which is amazing to think about and gets me very excited for Q2. My theory here is that I think they decided to keep the stores open "for now" knowing that they're going to need all sorts of logistics to deliver the high demand for the SR 3.

OR... as one of my buddies and I have discussed (tin foil hat time)... this was all planned from the outset to reduce the work force but still maintain their presence. Also create a "sale" by saying that the prices will go up on March 18th. I have one coworker that's looking to buy before that happens, so it worked.

Of course, I'm just a random dude with random opinions and ideas and have no insider knowledge or any way of corroborating any of this... just speculating and chatting. One good thing though is the stock price is up as of my typing this, so it seems to not be impacting that in a negative way.


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## B.Silva

The official press release about not closing so many stores, keeping test drives, and pricing.

https://www.tesla.com/blog/update-tesla-stores-and-pricing


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## AO - Pete

yeah, I agree, totally not a good look. It seems like all the decisions are still being made by Elon in isolation; that's what the board is for, to take measured decisions that align to the strategy. All this knee-jerk stuff is weird for a company of Tesla's size, never mind the stress it must be causing the employees who were on the block ,then off, now who knows.

The assumption of linearity between store numbers and the 6% discount also seems very contrived, we all know it's not that simple, and now closing half the stores doesn't really correlate to now only being able to discount the cars by half as much. Every store will have lease clauses, termination costs and all kinds of other overheads making every one different. Since nobody was expecting the 6% price cut, I still don't know why they did it; on it's own it strange, but pulling it in by half a week later is ever weirder. It might have been to goose demand, but it's a really odd way of doing it.

Even the SC v3 and Model Y announcement seem rushed; I guess Apple does this sort of thing all the time as well, but having to book short-notice travel pisses people off.

The elephant in the room seems to be that S & X can't fully leverage the v3 infrastructure; so (more tin hat stuff) are S & X coming up for a refresh, and this weird little moment is to boost sales of S & X that are already produced? There's not a lot to corroborate that theory, but from a development efficiency perspective, it must be to Tesla's advantage to get everything into the landscape aspect, and S & X have always been marketed, by Elon, as getting the new tech first. That's patently not the case when it comes to V3 charging.

There's more to this, maybe all will be revealed later this week.


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## B.Silva

I am glad they are going to keep test drives, though I suspect in a scaled back way. I am fine with online ordering. I think most people already are ordering via the website, even if at the store. The 7 day/100 mile return policy is cool but to me it doesn't replace the need for test drive. I would not have bought my Model 3 without test driving it first, even if I was given the option of returning it if I didn't like it. It's too much of a commitment without a test drive first. I am glad to see Tesla has, at least for now, made a course correction to continue with test drives.

A year ago while shopping for a new ICE SUV, I was sure I was going to buy a Porsche Macan S to replace my 2012 Audi Q5. I was happy I did a test drive, though, before ordering one. I didn't really care for it. The cargo space was much smaller than my Q5 and there were other things about the car I didn't like. I went with a 2018 Audi SQ5 instead. I'm really looking forward to the Model Y.


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## Bigriver

Lovesword said:


> I see a connection between this move and the overwhelming demand for the Standard Range Model 3 (Tesla has already adjusted their estimated delivery for them to 8 weeks!)
> I think even Tesla underestimated the amount of people looking to buy the SR 3...


I think the SR model 3 is a phenomenal deal. I wish I could buy dozens of them and give them to friends and family - ah, but I don't have that kind of money. Am happy to hear the estimate is up to 8 weeks. I Had been concerned that the time estimate was only 2 weeks when they first opened it up. I thought the SR becoming available would lead to long lines and even perhaps reinstituting the need to get an invite from the reservation system. But I also thought that the advent of DVDs would put movie theaters out of business, so I'm not exactly very good at predicting the future.


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## Artdept

the "raising prices" things isjust another plow to get people to rush place orders.
another form of a cash grab.. the more they tweet, the more dire the Cash position sounds.

if they are profiting 5-10 K per car, they need to sell a lot of cars to keep the machine moving. I cannot imagine what the weekly overheard is, but probally over 10 million easy?


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## garsh

Artdept said:


> another form of a cash grab.


I don't understand why people couch things in terms like this.

"cash grab"? It's a company that continues to struggle to become long-term profitable. They know that the window for them to ramp up production and grab market share is pretty short. Eventually, established automakers will figure out how to compete if Tesla doesn't maintain a lead in EV technology. And Tesla isn't going to last unless it's profitable. So yes, they need to try to "grab cash", because that's how you pay your 10's of thousands of employees, and pay for the R&D to develop additional vehicles.


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## Love

garsh said:


> I don't understand why people couch things in terms like this.
> 
> "cash grab"? It's a company that continues to struggle to become long-term profitable. They know that the window for them to ramp up production and grab market share is pretty short. Eventually, established automakers will figure out how to compete if Tesla doesn't maintain a lead in EV technology. And Tesla isn't going to last unless it's profitable. So yes, they need to try to "grab cash", because that's how you pay your 10's of thousands of employees, and pay for the R&D to develop additional vehicles.


Oh man, did I read Artdept's post wrong...


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## LUXMAN

ELON has tweeted that AP/FSD prices go back to normal on Monday as well. Upgrade while you can if you were on the fence


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## FRC

LUXMAN said:


> ELON has tweeted that AP/FSD prices go back to normal on Monday as well. Upgrade while you can if you were on the fence


DAMMIT @LUXMAN , Thanks to you I've now got $2k less than I had 15 minutes ago! I told myself I wouldn't buy FSD until there was a tangible benefit(and I've already got EAP). Price of FSD might not go up, but I can't see it going down. I suppose my tangible benefit is that I don't have to concern myself with this decision any more!!


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## webdriverguy

FRC said:


> DAMMIT @LUXMAN , Thanks to you I've now got $2k less than I had 15 minutes ago! I told myself I wouldn't buy FSD until there was a tangible benefit(and I've already got EAP). Price of FSD might not go up, but I can't see it going down. I suppose my tangible benefit is that I don't have to concern myself with this decision any more!!


You did the right thing. I doubt they will lower the prices for EAP/FSD again any time soon after monday


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## LUXMAN

FRC said:


> DAMMIT @LUXMAN , Thanks to you I've now got $2k less than I had 15 minutes ago! I told myself I wouldn't buy FSD until there was a tangible benefit(and I've already got EAP). Price of FSD might not go up, but I can't see it going down. I suppose my tangible benefit is that I don't have to concern myself with this decision any more!!


Glad to help , but he also confirmed that there will be a hardware upgrade to AP 3.0


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## FRC

LUXMAN said:


> Glad to help , but he also confirmed that there will be a hardware upgrade to AP 3.0


Did he confirm that the HW upgrade would be at no charge for those of us on FSD?


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## Artdept

webdriverguy said:


> You did the right thing. I doubt they will lower the prices for EAP/FSD again any time soon after monday


Don't worry, FSD. Will be included in the Y release if you pre order and put down a 5 k deposit.


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## MelindaV

LUXMAN said:


> Glad to help , but he also confirmed that there will be a hardware upgrade to AP 3.0


likewise - I was going to wait a couple more weeks, but went ahead and handed over my $2180 (tax included) to tesla this morning. I always expected the hardware would be included for everyone who paid for FSD one way or another, so wasn't concerned about that. Just attempting to spread out the wear and tear on my bank card this month 😆


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## LUXMAN

FRC said:


> Did he confirm that the HW upgrade would be at no charge for those of us on FSD?


This is what I got on Twitter. I believe it is included but ….


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## tivoboy

As usual, not enough clarity to take to the bank


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## webdriverguy

MelindaV said:


> likewise - I was going to wait a couple more weeks, but went ahead and handed over my $2180 (tax included) to tesla this morning. I always expected the hardware would be included for everyone who paid for FSD one way or another, so wasn't concerned about that. Just attempting to spread out the wear and tear on my bank card this month 😆


NON EAP owner here I was definitely going to get the 2k AP after the price cut but given the monday deadline i am thinking of going all in


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## LUXMAN

Having just bought this last week and going active on Saturday morning, I am glad I bought both. With just the AP, you cant change lanes in Autosteer. So you will have to overpower the autosteer to change lanes. Not hard but kinda jerky to do. With the FSD you get the lane change, Nav on AP, Summon and Hardware upgrade in the future. Glad I did it


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## Golden Gate

Hmmm.... maybe Tesla knew EXACTLY what they were doing..... 

NAW!!!!


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## webdriverguy

Golden Gate said:


> Hmmm.... maybe Tesla knew EXACTLY what they were doing.....
> 
> NAW!!!!


haha yes i think so too ...


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## Artdept

Lovesword said:


> Oh man, did I read Artdept's post wrong...
> View attachment 23150


I understand "we" are all fan boys that like to ride elons nuts... but it sure looks like him i mean a cash grab to me.
Time to step aside and Let Mary B run the Co.


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## webdriverguy

Artdept said:


> I understand "we" are all fan boys that like to ride elons nuts... but it sure looks like him i mean a cash grab to me.
> Time to step aside and Let Mary B run the Co.
> View attachment 23169


To be honest that might not be a bad thing for him to do. The company is mature enough now. He can still be the chief design officer or whatever he wants to be called.


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## Artdept

webdriverguy said:


> To be honest that might not be a bad thing for him to do. The company is mature enough now. He can still be the chief design officer or whatever he wants to be called.











I think he likes to be called "The Rock" these days, me thinks is a Mars type thing. ( photo credit: Unkown)


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## FRC

Not sure who might be best suited to run the "business". But it ain't Elon. Don't misunderstand me; without Elon, Tesla never happens. And we need Elon behind the scenes dreaming, imagining. But Tesla is now a business, Elon, not an idea. Time to let someone who is well versed in running a business run this business. LOVE the car, HATE the business.


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## John A Bailey

I heard they were installing a roulette wheel to guarantee every customer pays something different. Frankly I think they are doing a good job at this without the wheel


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## C.Ross

LUXMAN said:


> Having just bought this last week and going active on Saturday morning, I am glad I bought both. With just the AP, you cant change lanes in Autosteer. So you will have to overpower the autosteer to change lanes. Not hard but kinda jerky to do. With the FSD you get the lane change, Nav on AP, Summon and Hardware upgrade in the future. Glad I did it


Alternatively, you can pull down/push up on the the left/right indicator and that takes you out of autosteer, and then you can do the lane change without ever having to pull hard on the steering wheel. 
BUT, you do have that annoying beep beep that indicates you are no longer in autosteer every time you do that.

I am considering getting FSD but can't afford it - or should I be instead be saying I cannot afford to not get FSD because of the imminent return to it's normal price again. Augh. Frustrating.


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## LUXMAN

C.Ross said:


> Alternatively, you can pull down/push up on the the left/right indicator and that takes you out of autosteer, and then you can do the lane change without ever having to pull hard on the steering wheel.
> BUT, you do have that annoying beep beep that indicates you are no longer in autosteer every time you do that.
> 
> I am considering getting FSD but can't afford it - or should I be instead be saying I cannot afford to not get FSD because of the imminent return to it's normal price again. Augh. Frustrating.


Are you you saying use the turn signal to get out of auto steer? Are you meaning with AP without FSD? Cuz if I do that, the car changes lanes since I have the FSD.


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## C.Ross

LUXMAN said:


> Are you you saying use the turn signal to get out of auto steer? Are you meaning with AP without FSD? Cuz if I do that, the car changes lanes since I have the FSD.


Yes - I meant just for those with "AP" (not refering to EAP or FSD).


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## B.Silva

FSD, AP, EAP, NoA, TACC - lotsa acronyms I'm seeing these days. For other newbies like me,
FSD = Full Self Driving
AP = Auto Pilot
EAP = Enhanced Auto Pilot (what I got with my Model 3)
NoA = Navigation on Auto Pilot
TACC = Traffic Aware Cruise Control


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## SoFlaModel3

LUXMAN said:


> ELON has tweeted that AP/FSD prices go back to normal on Monday as well. Upgrade while you can if you were on the fence


Though the AP pricing fiasco disturbed me enough to make a video (below), I did upgrade to FSD yesterday for $2k


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## LUXMAN

SoFlaModel3 said:


> Though the AP pricing fiasco disturbed me enough to make a video (below), I did upgrade to FSD yesterday for $2k


See? He does have mind powers over you


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## webdriverguy

LUXMAN said:


> Are you you saying use the turn signal to get out of auto steer? Are you meaning with AP without FSD? Cuz if I do that, the car changes lanes since I have the FSD.


AP was activated yesterday for me. Glad I bought it. Today when I was on highway it was prompting me to hold the wheel which I had. Red screen came up and disabled auto steer for me for the rest of the drive. This happened after driving 25 miles. Annoying.


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## C.Ross

webdriverguy said:


> AP was activated yesterday for me. Glad I bought it. Today when I was on highway it was prompting me to hold the wheel which I had. Red screen came up and disabled auto steer for me for the rest of the drive. This happened after driving 25 miles. Annoying.


I may have mispoke when I said appling the turn signal turned off autosteer. I thought that it was doing that for me - but then yesterday it didn't seem to be doing that. I probably messed up. Sorry. I'll just need to buy FSD today.


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## C.Ross

webdriverguy said:


> AP was activated yesterday for me. Glad I bought it. Today when I was on highway it was prompting me to hold the wheel which I had. Red screen came up and disabled auto steer for me for the rest of the drive. This happened after driving 25 miles. Annoying.


Also - keep in mind when it says "hold the wheel" it doesn't matter how tightly you hold the wheel, the car is just monitoring for some slight resistance to its turning of the wheel. I remember being very frustrated gripping the wheel tightly as possible but now I realized I can hold it lightly with two fingers, while ever so gently tugging against the car's turning of the wheel.


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## SoFlaModel3

LUXMAN said:


> See? He does have mind powers over you


It's true and I think I knew I'd bite on it the whole time.


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## webdriverguy

C.Ross said:


> Also - keep in mind when it says "hold the wheel" it doesn't matter how tightly you hold the wheel, the car is just monitoring for some slight resistance to its turning of the wheel. I remember being very frustrated gripping the wheel tightly as possible but now I realized I can hold it lightly with two fingers, while ever so gently tugging against the car's turning of the wheel.


When driving back same thing happened autosteer disabled after 22 miles. I tried your trick but dint work. Looks like it going to take me some time to get used to this. Ordering FSD today I am in.


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## webdriverguy

webdriverguy said:


> When driving back same thing happened autosteer disabled after 22 miles. I tried your trick but dint work. Looks like it going to take me some time to get used to this. Ordering FSD today I am in.


Also when I try to activate auto steer I never get it in first try. I press down twice does not work, try again it works. Is there a trick for this as well? Sorry for the digression.


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## FRC

webdriverguy said:


> When driving back same thing happened autosteer disabled after 22 miles. I tried your trick but dint work. Looks like it going to take me some time to get used to this. Ordering FSD today I am in.


Do anything(other than just grip) to the steering wheel. Lightly pull one direction or the other, do anything with either scroll wheel, turn either blinker on, turn radio volume up or down. Anything that let's the car know that you are "hands on wheel". Ironically, just having your hands on the wheel is inadequate as the wheel has no pressure sensors.

There seems to be a rhythm to the lane keep enact. You can't double-tap too quickly or too slowly. It's sort of a tap pause tap.


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## LUXMAN

webdriverguy said:


> AP was activated yesterday for me. Glad I bought it. Today when I was on highway it was prompting me to hold the wheel which I had. Red screen came up and disabled auto steer for me for the rest of the drive. This happened after driving 25 miles. Annoying.


I drove NoA for about 120 miles today off and on and it worked well. One time it didn't like a trailer that this guy was pulling with a flapping tarp. It freaked out. Warning me of a side impact. But all in all pretty good. It told me to hold a couple time but just by resting my had at 3 or 9 O'clock, it provides enough torque to keep alerts at bay


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## FRC

LUXMAN said:


> I drove NoA for about 120 miles today off and on and it worked well. One time it didn't like a trailer that this guy was pulling with a flapping tarp. It freaked out. Warning me of a side impact. But all in all pretty good. It told me to hold a couple time but just by resting my had at 3 or 9 O'clock, it provides enough torque to keep alerts at bay


Glad to hear that you're getting used to it!


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## C.Ross

webdriverguy said:


> When driving back same thing happened autosteer disabled after 22 miles. I tried your trick but dint work. Looks like it going to take me some time to get used to this. Ordering FSD today I am in.


Re: "FSD". Me too. Ordered 1 minute ago.


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## C.Ross

webdriverguy said:


> Also when I try to activate auto steer I never get it in first try. I press down twice does not work, try again it works. Is there a trick for this as well? Sorry for the digression.


One suggestion is don't pull down "all the way". Just pull it down quickly 2x to less than you'd think you need to. To the first "resistance". I used to pull it down as low as it would go and then realized it doesn't need the full pull down. Makes it easier and quieter to activate. Just my suggestion - hopefully helps.


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## C.Ross

C.Ross said:


> One suggestion is don't pull down "all the way". Just pull it down quickly 2x to less than you'd think you need to. To the first "resistance". I used to pull it down as low as it would go and then realized it doesn't need the full pull down. Makes it easier and quieter to activate. Just my suggestion - hopefully helps.


Or maybe you were going too fast and it was only registering it as 1 pull down. Could try doing it slower?


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## NJturtlePower

LUXMAN said:


> Having just bought this last week and going active on Saturday morning, I am glad I bought both. With just the AP, you cant change lanes in Autosteer. So you will have to overpower the autosteer to change lanes. Not hard but kinda jerky to do. With the FSD you get the lane change, Nav on AP, Summon and Hardware upgrade in the future. Glad I did it


Recently added the new AP myself... True, you can't change lanes with Autosteer active with only the new AP package, but not true that you have to overpower AP/Autosteer to change lanes.

Fully engaging a turn signal in either direction (not the 3-blink half press signal) will kick off Autosteer but will leave you in the TACC mode maintaining distance and speed. From there you manually make the lane change and a quick double tap down on the drive stalk and you're Autoseering once again. The added tone from enable/disable is a little annoying, but the operation is fairly seamless. 

The other option that works with "AP lite" EAP or FSD would be lifting the drive stalk once UP quickly. This disengages all AP/FSD features all in one shot.



C.Ross said:


> I may have misspoke when I said applying the turn signal turned off autosteer. I thought that it was doing that for me - but then yesterday it didn't seem to be doing that. I probably messed up. Sorry. I'll just need to buy FSD today.


It does, see my reply/explanation above.


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## LUXMAN

NJturtlePower said:


> Recently added the new AP myself... True, you can't change lanes with Autosteer active with only the new AP package, but not true that you have to overpower AP/Autosteer to change lanes.
> 
> Fully engaging a turn signal in either direction (not the 3-blink half press signal) will kick off Autosteer but will leave you in the TACC mode maintaining distance and speed.


That's cool, but with the AP + FSD, you cant do that. You have to either disengage the whole thing with the Right Stalk or overpower it. I wish there was a better way to do it. I was cruising home today and had to overpower it for traffic being dumb


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## NJturtlePower

LUXMAN said:


> That's cool, but with the AP + FSD, you cant do that. You have to either disengage the whole thing with the Right Stalk or overpower it. I wish there was a better way to do it. I was cruising home today and had to overpower it for traffic being dumb


I missed the part about adding "both" as in AP + FSD in your previous response.... I was responding specifically to your comment of "_*With just the AP, you can't change lanes in Autosteer*_".

So since you have FSD, why would you not use Auto Lane Change rather than disabling Auto Steer to change lanes?


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## FRC

NJturtlePower said:


> I missed the part about adding "both" as in AP + FSD in your previous response.... I was responding specifically to your comment of "_*With just the AP, you can't change lanes in Autosteer*_".
> 
> So since you have FSD, why would you not use Auto Lane Change rather than disabling Auto Steer to change lanes?


Because on 5.15, Lane change is extraordinarily balky. I'm leaving in 4 weeks on an 8,000 mile road trip, and I hope like hell we have another update before then. Lane change in this iteration is the worst it has been so far. For me, it's not usable.


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## C.Ross

Did my first auto lane change today. I’m hooked. Was great.


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## LUXMAN

NJturtlePower said:


> I missed the part about adding "both" as in AP + FSD in your previous response.... I was responding specifically to your comment of "_*With just the AP, you can't change lanes in Autosteer*_".
> 
> So since you have FSD, why would you not use Auto Lane Change rather than disabling Auto Steer to change lanes?


Oh, I do at times. But there are some times when I see a situation developing, I like would rather take over just the steering, and leave the TACC on. Like passing a truck and I wanna hug the left side of the lane type thing. There are also times when it doesn't want to change lanes so I have to make it.


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## John A Bailey

webdriverguy said:


> AP was activated yesterday for me. Glad I bought it. Today when I was on highway it was prompting me to hold the wheel which I had. Red screen came up and disabled auto steer for me for the rest of the drive. This happened after driving 25 miles. Annoying.


Yep It is annoying. This happens to me several times a day when I exceed 90 mph. My wife and Officer Welch both think this is my fault though


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