After one week of crunching numbers, automakers all across the United States have unleashed in the first two days of the week a flood of press releases announcing their performance on the local market for both the month on March and, in some cases, for the first quarter of the year.
Usually, the numbers show the American consumer has a strong appetite for cars this year, sales record after sales record being reported across the industry. For electric vehicles, the first three months of the year proved great as well, for some better than for most.
Hit by production issues and criticism about the quality of the models it produces, Tesla managed to achieve an important milestone: in the first quarter of the year, the Model 3 has been America’s best selling electrified car.
According to Bloomberg, Tesla reported for the first quarter a number of 8,180 Model 3 cars delivered. That’s more than the performance achieved by plug-in hybrids Toyota Prius Prime (6,468) or the electric Chevrolet Bolt (4,375).
The success of the Model 3 has been obvious ever since Elon Musk’s company started taking orders for the car. In fact, its success is exactly the problem, as the huge number of reservations make the company unable to produce the numbers needed to match the demand.
Only this week Tesla announced it managed to assemble over 2,000 cars in seven days, a figure that, if maintained, might be enough to avoid further problems. Even so, the number of cars manufactured was well below the production target of 2,500 vehicles a week set for the end of March 2018.
As a result of these new numbers, Tesla’s shares rebounded slightly at the beginning of the week. The rise in value might have been even greater had the billionaire not made his now famous Bankwupt April Fool’s Day tweet which made his company lose some 2.5 percent of its value.
Hit by production issues and criticism about the quality of the models it produces, Tesla managed to achieve an important milestone: in the first quarter of the year, the Model 3 has been America’s best selling electrified car.
According to Bloomberg, Tesla reported for the first quarter a number of 8,180 Model 3 cars delivered. That’s more than the performance achieved by plug-in hybrids Toyota Prius Prime (6,468) or the electric Chevrolet Bolt (4,375).
The success of the Model 3 has been obvious ever since Elon Musk’s company started taking orders for the car. In fact, its success is exactly the problem, as the huge number of reservations make the company unable to produce the numbers needed to match the demand.
Only this week Tesla announced it managed to assemble over 2,000 cars in seven days, a figure that, if maintained, might be enough to avoid further problems. Even so, the number of cars manufactured was well below the production target of 2,500 vehicles a week set for the end of March 2018.
As a result of these new numbers, Tesla’s shares rebounded slightly at the beginning of the week. The rise in value might have been even greater had the billionaire not made his now famous Bankwupt April Fool’s Day tweet which made his company lose some 2.5 percent of its value.