No wonder, Tesla is a legacy automaker with no secret sauce nor moat.
Tesla has kept the price in the luxury car range in order to maintain it's brand.
Outside the SV/HN bubble, the Tesla is viewed as a luxury car
Addendum:
Luxury doesn't imply expensive. It's a branding strategy.
A Gucci bag or iPhone can be purchased with relatively minimal capital outlay, but will continue to hold a social cachet by being marketed as "exclusive" [0]
Just read the case study below to understand the strategy used. Turns out MBAs ain't as useless as HNers like to think
[0] - https://hbsp.harvard.edu/product/SMU954-PDF-ENG?Ntt=Gucci%3A...
I feel like it is more of a west/east coast divide. In Seattle/Portland/etc., you will see multiple Teslas at any street intersection, they are literally everywhere. NYC or ATL? Yeah, it definitely is not that common even in the slightest.
Model Y is going to be the most sold car model of 2023, not just in California, but in the whole world.
https://cleantechnica.com/2023/12/28/tesla-model-y-going-to-...
California has a $7500 rebate for PHEVs. That's on top of the federal rebate IIRC. California also offers the clean air vehicle passes to use HOV lanes.
So there's some additional help in California to push EVs and Tesla only makes EVs. When the Prius was the big fad car you saw them all over the place in California as well.
two examples, i use this[0] picture as my wallpaper and you can see one of them in there!
also, i have a charging point in front of my flat, and two teslas charge there every day.
Luxury is a brand concept, not a formal term for expensive.
If they are still trying to make cybertrucks at a profit at the end of 2024, they will be paying a pretty steep opportunity cost. But they're not "legacy."