While driving to the dentist a month or so ago, an ugly black truck stopped behind me at a signal light. The flat-black grill with carbon fiber protuberences and un-aerodynamic angles filled my rear-view mirror. Very unique. I noted the brand: MAR.
“Oh, brother,” I thought rolling my eyes, another EV brand. We have them here by the gross. A suburban city with money enough to buy them and leisure time enough to charge them. But wait…
Grill? EVs don’t need grills. I was looking at that grill in a rear-view mirror.
Idiot.
The truck was a RAM, a Dodge RAM, with adolescent, after-market crap bolted on.
Rolling my eyes at myself now, I drove on, schaden-gigglen about all the EVs stranded across the nation in the January cold snap we were all enduring (even in Houston!)
A well-worn military cliche is that your plan never survives contact with the enemy. However, the enemy’s plan never survives contact with you either.* That is just one of the few things I will never forget from my time as a soldier. The others are: (1) never take your weapon into the porta-john with you and (2) the look on SFC Smiraldo’s face the day after Bill Clinton was elected.
So, looking backward wrongly is something both sides of an issue will do and often use that flawed analysis to forcast badly. Which is what the EV crowd seems to have done. We were all told 2023 was THE year the big transistion would occur. Errr, not so much:
The figure above is from a 28 Janauary Wall Street Journal article which reported:
“There’s still buzz, but I’m not seeing people ready to replace their Kia Telluride or Chevy Tahoe—that big SUV they use to take kids to hockey—with an EV,” said St. Louis-area car dealer Brad Sowers.
Many of the passionate EV buyers, who were willing to pay a premium for a battery-powered car, are now gone, he said. They have been replaced by more-discerning customers, asking a lot more questions about charging times and battery life and range, Sowers added.
In other words, Moms and Pops of America are not going for the EV hype. They don’t want to sqeeze into a small cabin, or lose 50% of their driving range on a cold day, or wait 10 hours for a 70% charge. They want what people around the world want in transportation: reliability and versatility. Few, if any, EVs offer both.
The sales numbers reveal who the EV audience really is:
And while EV sales passed the 1 million mark this year (out of roughly 16 million total sales), it's worth noting that 83% of EVs sold are considered luxury models, with price tags to match. — from Axios citing data from the EIA
Oh, and folks who bought these luxury vehicles all got a government subsidy. Real, workin’ man stuff, there. That subsidy ended for most cars 1 January 2024.
I am not saying that if you own a Tesla you are an upper-class twit. What I am saying is that your EV is not likely your ONLY car. You most likely have the means ($$$) and time resiliance to endure the pain-in-the-ass moments EVs inflict on their passengers. Such moments are not a big deal when you have a Tahoe in the driveway or you can just work from home that day. If you drive a forklift for an hourly wage, you are going to miss work if Charlie Drunkenstupid took out a transformer while you slept leaving your EV undercharged and your alarm clock blinking.
Think about it. Would a family in Des Moines, Iowa be wise to keep an EV as their only car? Hell no. The first harsh winter day would reduce the range of their car by up to 70%. Would an independant construction contractor be wise to do so? A 24-hour emergency plumber? An ambulance?
Until people and services like that start having faith in EVs, and buying them, sales are not likely to improve. The EV plan didn’t survive contact with the enemy. And Mom and Pop America are the “enemy,” in the minds of many, and ought to be riding a bus or train anyway.
Mom and Pop America are, in the aggregate, better economists than EV buyers. While those with disposible income and resilitant jobs jumped on the stalling EV wagon, Mom and Pop were wary of the technology. They cannot afford to buy virtue. But neither are they knuckle -dragging slobs with big carbon feet.
What they (Americans) are buying more of are relaible hybrid vehicles which were largely ignored by a lick-spittle American/Canadian auto industry enamored of and intimidated by politicians like Gavin Newsom (except Toyota, who told them all to go suck a lithium-lemon).
This is not good for U.S. automakers who stumble-bummed into another “guvment” subsidy promise. They did not, again, take counsel of their customers. Proverbs 15:22: “Without counsel purposes are disappointed: but in the multitude of counsellers they are established.”
From the Wall Street Journal, 6 February:
Hybrid sales grew last year at a faster clip than sales for pure electric vehicles in the U.S. and some other markets. Signs have emerged that the EV push might have gotten ahead of U.S. consumers who are worried about charging problems and higher prices. That has steered them toward less expensive hybrids, which can be filled up with gasoline.
Automakers that had been rushing to pivot toward full EVs are now reconsidering.
General Motors said last week it would introduce some plug-in hybrid models in North America after facing pressure from dealers.
Ford Motor said last year it would seek to quadruple its hybrid sales in the next five years.
What Ford really means is that they will quadruple manufacturing. Their plan may not survive contact with the enemy. Actual sales are subject to the judgement of that enemy. Mom and Pop America do not like being treated like suckers. By the time GM and Ford look backward rightly and start making proper hybrids, Toyota/Honda’s hybrid reliability and affordable pricing will have likely carried the day.
Still, I can’t wait to test drive one of them new DROF trucks!
For a totally ROCKIN insight on the matter, crank this awesome Neil Young song, Motor City, as loud as you dare!
* Lt. Backsight Forethought is a character in The Defence of Duffer’s Drift, a book by Captain, and later, British General S.E. Hinton, This was once required reading for all U.S Army Officer Candidates. Read it HERE> The Defence of Duffer’s Drift.
"Mom and Pop America are, in the aggregate, better economists than EV buyers." Excellent quote.
Wisdom comes far more readily when money is short, and we are never more deluded than when money is flush.
All true--unless, of course, your government mandates them and makes it virtually impossible to buy a gas-guzzling car (as will occur here in the near future). Last month, when the province of Alberta was hit with a storm and -50C temperatures, people were told to "reduce your electricity use, try not to cook if you don't have to, and don't charge your electric cars." Yep, that will work out well.
Also: why not bring your weapon into the porta-potty? I'm dying (no pun intended) to know, now.