There is a Telo Discord channel which is quite active. The CEO Jason Marks often posts in the Discord channel.No idea what they talk about but whatever it is, there’s not a lot of conversation with only 19 members.
Forget the instagram influencers, THAT is how you get some engagement with your target market. Would be fun if they had an official one for Slate.
Jason mentioned Discord during the Jay Leno vid. It’s how a JLG producer found Jason and got in contact…at that point the prototype wasn’t finished. I have some experience using Discord at a previous company…not bad software.
I can definitely see the Telo target skewing younger (regardless of price). I also don't see the Telo as a second car, fleet machine, or small business vehicle. Unless the business is making balloon animals at the county fair.
There are a lot of questionable design choices on the Telo. Besides the obvious lack of a front crumple zone, the exposed wheels and door handle design that were brought up are a couple of the most glaring.I have been seeing people in comment sections talk about how great the Telo looks and how ugly the Slate is, boggles my mind.
I'm curious if they have a future owners forum set up like we do, like a parallel universe but everyone hating on the Slate and trying to figure out the Telo.
I don’t think Telo thinks their market is going to be as big as Slate or other mainstream EVs. One of their advisors was the former CEO of Aston Martin who had to be laser focused on being able to produce low volume vehicles at a profit. There are a lot of people that don’t agree that bigger is better. I would not buy a Lightning, R1T or Silverado EV at any price. Trucks over the years have gotten way too big and I want to do the opposite of that. Pedestrian safety has really deteriorated due to these hoods that are 4 to 5 feet high and have limited opportunity to see a pedestrian or bicyclist before they are run over. I like to keep my vehicles in the garage and having a small vehicle leaves room to work on a bicycle, dirt bike or tractor. Additionally, a small truck is much easier to load. I don’t want to try to load a dirt bike or tractor into the back of the bed that is four feet or more off the ground.
I understand what you're saying, but the things about Telo that appeal to you doesn't really capture a wide audience if Telo wants to be successful. It's supposed to be a utilitarian EV, not a boutique supercar that's always garaged. You are right that the Silverado EV isn't in the same price bracket as the Telo, but that doesn't mean other EVs like the Kia EV9 won't be cross shopped. The logic of many American shoppers when making a big purchase like a new car is going to be why pay more for less when I can get more for the same money. This is predicting that the Telo will not reach its $40k selling point.
I'm 34 and all of my friends are either my age or in their mid 20s and are all into the Slate over the Telo. The big variable, however, is these are all people that are heavily into autocross / engine-swaps / tuning. They all are very used to having to work around 'too much' technology in cars and appreciate how simple things can be when you are swapping engines in a '74 Maverick or doing extensive track mods to a '98 Subaru Imprezza. I never thought I'd meet a mid 20s Fiero owner in this decade, that's for sure. The replaceable body panels are a big appeal for them.
It’s a tech nerd fan boi clown car.
