Tesla is now offering free lifetime supercharging for Foundation Series Cybertrucks purchased as standard vehicles, suggesting it is getting rid of very expensive limited edition vehicles.
Tesla brought cars with limited edition first series, such as the Founders and Signature series for the first Roadsters, Model S and Model all, but brought back the tradition of the Cybertruck with the Foundation series.
The Foundation Series is a full-featured debut model with a $20,000 markup on base costs and adds several default options. Delivery began at the end of November 2023.
The vehicle was being promoted well, and while Tesla’s limited editions typically only last a few months and a few thousand vehicles, the Foundation series lasted for almost a year, and Tesla only started settling for non-Foundation configurations in October. As a result, Tesla sold around 30,000 Foundation Series Cybertrucks, much more than its previous limited editions.
But ultimately, the number of consumers willing to pay more than $100,000 for a truck originally advertised with a base value of $40,000 appears to have dried up, and Tesla will now have to look for artistic tactics to remove those cars from the market. inventory.
Recently, Electrek reported that Tesla even went so far as to polish the Foundation Series badges on the trucks and then ship them to Canada to sell as non-Foundation trucks.
However, even that doesn’t appear to have been enough, as Tesla is now taking the limited number of Cybertrucks left in stock and providing lifetime supercharging to those who purchase them, an advantage the original Foundation Series trucks didn’t have. . not obtained.
Lifetime supercharging is an old benefit that Tesla introduced early on, either as an incentive to purchase or because it’s less difficult than building a payment formula around a network they had just built. build. The purchase benefits went through several iterations, but eventually became too great and Tesla ended the era of lifetime free supercharging in 2018.
However, it recently brought the perk back to clear out Model S inventory among a steep decline in Model S sales, showing that Tesla is willing to reopen the Pandora’s Box of free supercharging if circumstances call for it. And now two weeks after doing that for Model S vehicles, it’s also doing it for Cybertrucks.
You can locate those cars on the Tesla stock online page and search for cars near you. Currently, there are 7 available here in Southern California; not many, but this is just one region of the country.
To qualify, you’ll need to purchase a new Cybertruck Foundation Series after December 27, 2024, which means that original Foundation Series owners who were the first to spend $120,000 on this truck won’t get retroactive advantages from this advantage. Free Supercharge benefits are tied to your Tesla account and are not transferable to any other user or vehicle.
You still have to pay idle and congestion fees to Superchargers, and you can’t use the car to run a taxi service (as Tesloop’s original round trip service did, which was one of the reasons the merit initial has disappeared). .
Finally, a Cybertruck purchased this way is not eligible for the Powershare coupon included with other Foundation Series trucks. So it turns out you’re trading off some perks (although Powershare can end up costing much more than that, for some installations).
It’s another sign that Tesla is seeing as much demand as it expected from the polarizing vehicle.
After its first unveiling in 2019, Cybertruck managed to rack up more than 250,000 pre-orders in less than a week, and then peaked at potentially 2 million reservations, according to crowdsourced data.
But when the truck hit the road, things didn’t go exactly as planned. The vehicle was launched late and over budget, and also lacked some of the originally promised specifications. The first “Foundation Series” styles to hit the market started at $100,000, a far cry from the promised starting price of $40,000. It’s now available for a base value of $79,000, but a long-term base RWD model promised for $61,000 recently disappeared from Tesla’s website.
Despite all this, it is still the best-selling electric pickup truck in the United States and the third best-selling electric vehicle with a very high average transaction price, which represents a good replacement percentage for the company.
I don’t think this new incentive will help move the remaining FS shares. The $100,000/$120,000 Cybertrucks will be incredibly difficult to move after January 1, 2025, only 2 days left.
I don’t see a wealthy customer excited about an FS truck collecting dust in the back of a service center with a VIN assembled months ago. The VINs of the most recent Cybertruck are around 60. xxx.
Still, demand appears to be well below the sky-high expectations for the vehicle. That hold of about 2 million cars lasted for about 30,000 cars when Tesla began allowing unreserved orders in October.
Tesla also recently shut down its Cybertruck line for 3 days and has not made any public comments as to why. Several theories have been floated as to why, but at a time when Cybertruck sales don’t seem to be going as planned despite it being a critical time for the company in terms of deliveries, a sudden stop is suspicious.
But given the Cybertruck’s polarizing design, its premium price, and its apparent deal with Elon Musk, which is becoming more and more unpleasant by the day, it’s no surprise that there are fewer takers for the vehicle than projections might have suggested ago. five years.
Charge your electric vehicle at home using rooftop solar panels. Find a reliable and competitively priced solar installer near you on EnergySage, for free. They have pre-vetted installers competing for your business, ensuring high-quality solutions and 20-30% savings. It’s free, with no sales calls until you choose an installer. Compare personalized solar quotes online and receive guidance from unbiased Energy Advisers. Get started here. – ad*
Jameson has been driving electric cars since 2009, and covering EVs, sustainability and policy for Electrek since 2016.
You can contact him at jamie@electrek. co.