美国的汽车经销商希望“放慢”电动汽车的步伐,究竟是为了谁?

标签:
美国电动汽车加价价格报告经销商 |
分类: 车展的映像 |
美国东部时间2023年11月28日下午7:46
作者:帕特里克·乔治Patrick Georgehttps://cdn.motor1.com/images/mgl/P33LYr/s3/volkswagen-id-4-suvs-awaiting-delivery.jpg
总的来说,美国的汽车经销商对销售电动汽车并不感到兴奋,这已经不是什么秘密了。近二十年来一直如此。但即使电动汽车市场在 2023 年经历了起起落落,经销商的这种恐惧也与所有趋势并不相符,这些趋势表明,大部分电气化的新车未来即将到来。
这就是为什么我发现成千上万的汽车经销商恳求乔·拜登总统为了“消费者”的利益而“放慢”电动汽车的过渡,这不仅仅是一点点虚伪。在最坏的情况下,他们最近的抵制可能意味着对更广泛采用电动汽车的打击,而美国和我们的气候确实无法承受。
让我们回顾一下。今天早些时候,一个名为“EV Voice of the Customer”的网站在网上出现,上面有一封由3800多家美国汽车经销商签署的致拜登政府的公开信。在其中,这些经销商表示,对电动汽车的“热情已经停滞不前”,而他们中的许多正在堆积他们的地块,这证明白宫的目标是到2030年让所有新车销售的50%是电动汽车,这是不现实和站不住脚的。《汽车新闻》今天报道称,一家在内布拉斯加州、堪萨斯州和科罗拉多州设有门店的经销商巨头是幕后推手。
涉及的经销商名单可能并不奇怪。大多数都有丰田经销商。近400家是福特经销商,300多家是雪佛兰和本田经销商,200多家销售各种Stellantis品牌。许多销售承诺在未来几年内实现全电动化的品牌,如大众、奥迪和沃尔沃。
(非常奇怪的是,其中四位签字人代表了Polestar经销商。
问题是,这封信中散布着一些真相。今年电动汽车销量起伏不定。一些传统汽车制造商,特别是美国的通用汽车和福特,一直在努力应对生产挑战,并将其业务转变为电池和软件驱动的业务。电动汽车仍然很昂贵,我们的公共充电网络还没有达到他们需要的地方,汽车制造商和销售人员需要做更多的教育,以帮助人们摆脱汽油。
但汽车经销商的担忧不应被误认为是消费者的权益保护。许多经销商(但公平地说,肯定不是全部)从未想过使用电动汽车。他们不想威胁到他们从零件和维修中获得的丰厚收入,他们不想投资于现场充电和经销商教育,他们不想改变法律上的策略,这些策略使他们中的许多人在一个多世纪的汽油车销售中变得非常富有。(这也是为什么特斯拉一直采用直接面向消费者的销售模式,以及大多数电动汽车初创公司纷纷效仿的原因。
因此,如果我们逐行拆解这个论点并不难:
您的政府提出了一些法规,这些法规基本上将强制要求向电池电动汽车(BEV)进行大幅转变,并在2032年之前逐年增加,届时在美国销售的每三辆汽车中就有两辆必须是电池电动汽车。目前,有许多优秀的纯电动汽车可供消费者购买。这些车辆是许多人的理想选择,我们相信它们的吸引力会随着时间的推移而增长。然而,现实情况是,今天的电动汽车需求跟不上现行法规促使大量涌入我们经销商的纯电动汽车。
我会称赞他们“他们的吸引力会随着时间的推移而增长”的部分,因为我认为这也是真的。但我不同意这样一种观点,即这些新的电动汽车完全是由“现行法规”推动的,而不是已经酝酿多年的产品,包括在特朗普政府监管狂野西部期间。
这些经销商忽略了这些是全球汽车公司的事实;他们可能拥有本地化的运营和本地化的产品组合(当然,有些比其他的更多),但美国EPA驱动的零排放汽车与欧盟、英国和中国都在做的事情相差不远。诚然,至少有一些目标可能会被推迟。事实上,英国就是这样做的。但大多数汽车制造商不希望世界各地的标准大相径庭。对于他们大规模制造汽车或为零排放未来做准备的能力来说,这并不是一件好事。也许这些经销商应该向他们的汽车制造商而不是白宫提出这个问题。继续前进:
去年,人们对电动汽车充满希望和炒作。早期采用者形成了一条初始线路,并准备在我们出售这些车辆后立即购买它们。但这种热情已经停滞不前。如今,未售出的 BEV 供应量激增,因为它们的销售速度远不如到达我们经销商的速度——即使有大幅降价、制造商激励措施和慷慨的政府激励措施。
虽然这些法规的目标令人钦佩,但它们需要消费者的接受才能成为现实。随着时间的流逝,越来越明显的是,根据当前和预测的客户需求,这种尝试电动汽车的授权是不现实的。电动汽车已经堆积在我们的地段上,这是我们在市场上客户需求的最佳指标。
我同情那些无法移动这些电动汽车的经销商,即使他们的难题对那些想要它们的人来说意味着巨大的交易。但他们的数据非常有选择性。仅在美国,今年的电动汽车销量将创下历史新高;几乎每家汽车制造商都是如此,即使是那些苦苦挣扎的汽车制造商也是如此。采用率可能没有这些经销商想要的那么快,但它正在飙升。呼吁拜登政府改变规则似乎不太可能改变这一要求。
总统先生,没有政府机构,没有智囊团,也没有民意调查公司比我们更了解汽车客户。我们每天都与客户交谈。作为零售汽车经销商,我们对销售的产品是不可知的。我们的业务是为客户提供满足其预算和生活方式需求的车辆。
哦,当然!美国人没有比汽车经销商更真实的朋友了,他们五位数和六位数的加价,臭名昭著的掠夺性销售策略和巨大的游说力量,已经将他们的商业模式写入了联邦每个州的法律。
我想问汽车经销商:如果你站在大家这边,为什么每个人都这么讨厌你?
一些客户在市场上购买电动汽车,我们很高兴能出售它们。但大多数客户根本没有准备好做出改变。他们担心BEV负担不起。许多没有用于家庭充电的车库或方便使用公共充电站。客户还担心在寒冷或炎热的天气中失去续航里程。有些人每天通勤时间很长,没有多余的时间给电池充电。卡车购买者尤其对牵引时范围的急剧损失望而却步。今天的技术不足以满足我们大多数消费者的需求。
我们的制造商可以而且将要解决其中许多挑战,但其中许多挑战超出了他们的控制范围。可靠的充电网络、电网稳定性、材料采购以及许多其他问题需要时间来解决。最后,许多人只想自己选择适合自己的车辆。
同样,我并不完全不同意其中的大部分内容。这反映了许多司机非常合理的担忧,我从来没有认为如果某人明天不跑出去买特斯拉或其他东西,他们就是坏人。但经销商在这里忽视了自己在驾驶员教育中的作用;还记得最近《华盛顿邮报》关于销售人员坚持不能在高速公路上驾驶宝马 i3 的报道吗?这就是为什么很难认真对待这个论点的原因。它伪装成从一群人中寻找小家伙,他们一直在反对资本改进、教育和最佳实践的改变,这将有助于确保他们在这场技术变革中的作用。
这就是为什么通用汽车和福特都试图打击他们的经销商。他们的高管永远不会承认这一点,但这可能就是现代汽车明年试图在亚马逊上销售汽车的原因。正因如此,Polestar采用混合直销模式来应对两者所带来的挑战。这就是为什么 Rivian 和 Lucid 从不打扰汽车经销商的原因。
最后,将所有这些挂在“法规”上就更没有意义了:
总统先生,现在是时候对不切实际的政府电动汽车授权踩刹车了。留出时间让电池技术进步。留出时间让 BEV 更实惠。留出时间开发国内矿物来源以制造电池。留出时间来构建充电基础设施并证明其可靠性。最重要的是,让美国消费者有时间适应这项技术并选择购买电动汽车。
首先,发展国内电池业务、采矿和更强大的充电基础设施正是拜登政府正在做的事情。所有这些都是《通胀削减法案》和《两党基础设施法案》目标的一部分,即使最终结果往往达不到这些崇高的目标。
但是,让我们更深入地考虑一下如何给这种过渡更多的“时间”。“时间”到底是什么意思?年?几十 年?那里有什么合适的,成本是多少?汽车制造商是否会将他们的电动汽车目标定在永远继续生产内燃机汽车的道路上?除了通用汽车,几乎没有人这样做。
甚至与我交谈过的许多行业专家也认为混合动力车有最终的到期日,此外,并不是每个汽车制造商现在都懒得出售这些汽车。严格的法规难道不会迫使汽车公司快速行动,发挥创造力并在电动汽车竞赛中保持竞争力吗?
正如我之前所写的,这是一次技术转型——与其说是对电动汽车的考验,不如说是对汽车制造商大规模生产电动汽车的能力的考验,价格可承受且有利可图。汽车行业一直在追求性能和效率,即使它需要被监管力量拖到那里踢和尖叫,而电动汽车代表了两者的顶峰。混合动力车现在卖得这么好,事实证明,如果你给他们机会,美国人会很乐意放弃汽油。
整个行业面临的最大风险是比亚迪在墨西哥建厂,以便它可以以高价在美国销售尖端电动汽车,以及我们迫在眉睫的气候灾难。(当然,他们的信中根本没有提到这一点。将新车过渡到零排放汽车并不能完全解决气候变化问题,但这样做可以开辟一条通往比我们现在面临的灾难性小得多的未来的道路。
借用一位电动汽车领域政策方面的朋友的一句话,“经销商自称是消费者的代言人,就像渔民自称是鱼的代言人一样。如果美国正处于电动汽车销售不平衡的时刻,那么它最终会过去。这个国家的汽车经销商将不得不决定他们是否会成为接下来的一部分。
原文阅读
America's Car Dealers Want To 'Slow Down' On EVs. But For Who, Exactly?
Car dealers have never embraced an electric transition. Now they're stepping up their fight against it.
Nov 28, 2023 at 7:46pm ET
By: Patrick George
It's no great secret that on the whole, America's car dealers aren't exactly thrilled about selling electric vehicles. That's been true for almost two decades now. But even with the ups and downs that the EV market has had in 2023, that dealer trepidation doesn't square with all the trends that point to a largely electrified new-car future just around the corner.
It's why I find thousands of car dealers imploring President Joe
Biden to "slow down" the EV transition for the good of "the
consumer" to be more than a little
Let's recap a bit. Earlier today, a website called "EV Voice of the Customer"
appeared online with an open letter to the Biden Administration
signed by more than 3,800 U.S. car dealers. In it, those dealers
say "enthusiasm has stalled" for EVs, and the fact that many of
them are piling up on their lots is evidence that this White
House's
The list of dealers involved probably isn't surprising. Most
have Toyota dealerships. Nearly 400 are Ford dealers, more than 300
are Chevrolet and Honda dealers, and more than 200 sell various
Stellantis brands. The list goes on from there. Many sell brands
committed to going all-electric in the next few years, like
Volkswagen, Audi and Volvo.
(Very curiously, four of the signatories represent Polestar
dealerships; someone needs to go check on those folks and make
sure they're doing okay.)
The thing is, there are grains of truth scattered throughout
this letter. EV sales have had dramatic ups and downs this year.
Some legacy automakers, in particular General Motors and Ford in
the U.S., have struggled with production challenges and
transitioning their businesses to a battery- and software-driven
one. EVs remain expensive, our public charging networks aren't
where they need to be yet, and a lot more education needs to be
done from automakers and salespeople alike to help people break up
with gasoline.
But concerns from car dealers shouldn't be mistaken for consumer
advocacy. Many dealers—but certainly not all, to be fair—have never
wanted to traffic in EVs. They don't want to threaten their
lucrative revenue from parts and repairs, they don't want to have
to invest in on-site charging and dealer education and they don't
want to change
the enshrined-into-law tactics that have made many of them
extremely wealthy over a century of gasoline car sales. (This
is also why Tesla has always had a direct-to-consumer sales model,
and why most EV startups have followed suit.)
As a result, it's not terribly hard to dismantle this argument if we take it line by line:
Your Administration has proposed regulations that would essentially mandate a dramatic shift to battery-electric vehicles (BEVs), increasing year after year until 2032, when two out of every three vehicles sold in America would have to be battery-electric.
Currently, there are many excellent battery-electric vehicles available for consumers to purchase. These vehicles are ideal for many people, and we believe their appeal will grow over time. The reality, however, is that electric vehicle demand today is not keeping up with the large influx of BEVs arriving at our dealerships prompted by the current regulations.
I'll give them credit for the "their appeal will grow over time"
part, because I think that's true too. But I take issue with the
idea that these new EVs are prompted solely by "current
regulations" and are not products that have been in the works for
many years, including during the regulatory Wild West that was the
Trump Administration.
These dealers omit the fact that these are global car companies;
they may have localized operations and localized product portfolios
(some more than others, certainly) but America's EPA-driven
zero-emission vehicle isn't far off what
the European Union,
the United Kingdom and
China are all doing too. Granted, it's possible that at least
some of those goals could get pushed
back.
Last year, there was a lot of hope and hype about EVs. Early adopters formed an initial line and were ready to buy these vehicles as soon as we had them to sell. But that enthusiasm has stalled. Today, the supply of unsold BEVs is surging, as they are not selling nearly as fast as they are arriving at our dealerships—even with deep price cuts, manufacturer incentives, and generous government incentives.
While the goals of the regulations are admirable, they require consumer acceptance to become a reality. With each passing day, it becomes more apparent that this attempted electric vehicle mandate is unrealistic based on current and forecasted customer demand. Already, electric vehicles are stacking up on our lots which is our best indicator of customer demand in the marketplace.
I am sympathetic to the dealers who can't move these EVs, even
if their conundrum means great deals for those who want them. But
their data is awfully selective. In the U.S. alone, this year
will be a record one for EV sales; that's true of nearly every
automaker, even the struggling ones. The rate of adoption may not
be as fast as these dealers want, but it is skyrocketing. Appealing
to the Biden Administration to change the rules doesn't seem likely
to change that demand.
(There's also no mention of sky-high interest rates hurting EV sales, but that's a can of worms not worth going into.)
Mr. President, no government agency, no think tank, and no polling firm knows more about the automobile customer than us. We talk to customers every day. As retail automotive dealerships, we are agnostic as to what we sell. Our business is to provide customers with vehicles that meet the needs of their budgets and lifestyles.
Oh, for sure! Americans have no truer friends than the car
dealerships, with their
five- and six-figure markups,
infamously predatory sales tactics
I would ask this to the car dealers: if you're on everyone's
side,
why does everyone hate you so much?
Some customers are in the market for electric vehicles, and we are thrilled to sell them. But the majority of customers are simply not ready to make the change. They are concerned about BEVs being unaffordable. Many do not have garages for home charging or easy access to public charging stations. Customers are also concerned about the loss of driving range in cold or hot weather. Some have long daily commutes and don’t have the extra time to charge the battery. Truck buyers are especially put off by the dramatic loss of range when towing. Today’s current technology is not adequate to support the needs of the majority of our consumers.
Many of these challenges can and will be addressed by our manufacturers, but many of these challenges are outside of their control. Reliable charging networks, electric grid stability, sourcing of materials, and many other issues need time to resolve. And finally, many people just want to make their own choice about what vehicle is right for them.
Again, I don't completely disagree with much of this. It's
reflective of the very valid concerns that many drivers have, and I
have never ascribed to the idea that someone is a bad person if
they don't run out and buy a Tesla or something tomorrow. But the
dealers neglect their own role in driver education here; remember
that recent
Washington Post story about the salesperson who insisted
a BMW i3 couldn't be driven on the highway?
It's why
GM and Ford both have tried cracking down on their dealers.
Their executives won't ever admit it, but it's probably why
Hyundai is trying to sell cars on Amazon next year. It's
why Polestar employs a hybrid-direct sales model to get around
the challenges involved with both. It's why Rivian and Lucid never
bothered with car dealers.
And hanging all of this on "regulations" makes even less sense
in closing:
Mr. President, it is time to tap the brakes on the unrealistic government electric vehicle mandate. Allow time for the battery technology to advance. Allow time to make BEVs more affordable. Allow time to develop domestic sources for the minerals to make batteries. Allow time for the charging infrastructure to be built and prove reliable. And most of all, allow time for the American consumer to get comfortable with the technology and make the choice to buy an electric vehicle.
First and foremost,
But let's think a little deeper about giving this transition more "time." What does "time" mean here, anyway? Years? Decades? What's appropriate there, and at what cost? Do automakers punt their EV goals down the road to keep making internal combustion vehicles forever? Besides GM, almost none of them are doing this.
Even many industry experts I speak to think hybrids have an
eventual expiration date, and besides, not every automaker can even
be bothered to sell those right now. And wouldn't tough regulations
force the car companies to move fast, get creative and stay
competitive in the EV race?
As I've written before, this
is a technological transition—less a test of EVs and more a
test of automakers' ability to make them at scale, at affordable
prices and profitably. The auto industry has always chased
performance and efficiency, even when it needs to be dragged there
kicking and screaming by regulatory forces, and EVs represent the
apex of both.
The biggest risks this entire industry faces with wanting more
"time" are
BYD building factories in Mexico so it can sell cutting-edge EVs in
America at fire-sale prices, and our looming climate disaster.
(Which, of course, isn't mentioned in their letter at all.)
Transitioning new cars to zero-emission vehicles won't entirely fix
climate change, but doing so creates a path to a vastly less
disastrous future than we're facing now.