Post by Barry Kresch

Can You Recommend a Dealership?

It is a common query we get. A consumer is shopping for an EV that isn’t a Tesla, Rivian, or Lucid. Maybe they had a poor dealer experience or their friend had a poor experience. Either way, they don’t want to waste their time walking into a dealership only for a salesperson to try and switch pitch them to ICE. That is by far the biggest complaint we hear. Followed by dealers who are clueless about EVs generally, don’t have a vehicle charged for a test drive, whose one EV expert “isn’t here right now,” or don’t know the incentives.

Using CHEAPR as a Proxy

While we have had personal interactions with some dealers, there are 270 licensed new car dealers in the state and we certainly don’t know all of them. Our workaround is to use CHEAPR rebates as a proxy. It isn’t perfect as some dealers do not sell CHEAPR-eligible vehicles. (The CHEAPR program has an MSRP* cap of $50,000.) And some manufacturers barely make any EVs. But for certain makes, it works well. We sort the data by make and compare like to like.

This information was compiled using data from the CHEAPR portal through December 21. There were 3677 CHEAPR rebates awarded in 2023 to this point. The program has been running pretty hot. Of these, 2022 were for Tesla and the remaining 1655 were spread amongst the other makes.

While we don’t quite have the entire year, we do have plenty of data to portray the good, bad and the ugly. As we have seen in past years, some dealers do a great job and some don’t even seem to know how to spell “EV.” There may be (and probably are) dealers for a given make that do not appear in these charts. That would happen if they had zero rebates.

Both battery electric vehicles (BEV) and plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEV) are included in the data. The first chart is the number of rebates by make for non-Tesla brands, followed by dealership detail for all makes with a minimum of 10 rebates, listed alphabetically by make.

*The MSRP cap in CHEAPR is the base price of a given trim level, before options.

Post by Barry Kresch

CHEAPR as a Proxy for EV-Friendly Dealers

It is not unusual for a consumer to reach out to us, usually after a bad sales experience, and ask if we can recommend a dealership. We have some recommendations from members who have had good experiences, but nothing that covers every vehicle make and every dealership across the state. This is our attempt to at least partially address this.

We are using CHEAPR rebates sorted by dealership within vehicle make as a rough proxy for dealer EV-friendliness. There are some limitations. Not all makes have CHEAPR-eligible vehicles. They may be too expensive (e.g. Jaguar) or they’re just not in the game (e.g. Honda). EV prices have gone up in this inflationary time and the CHEAPR MSRP cap was $42,000 for the first 6 months of the year, rising to $50,000 as of July.  There have been continued difficulties with vehicle availability, but at least we are comparing like to like.

Some dealerships are charging a “market adjustment,” meaning the vehicles are being sold for above the MSRP. That does not get reflected in CHEAPR. The MSRP cap is based on the manufacturer’s base MSRP for the trim level without options. That may, however, have deterred some consumers from doing business with them.

There continues to be wide variation among dealership performance, as in past years. If you know of a dealership but do not see it in the charts, that means there were no rebates associated with it in 2022. Sometimes there seems to be a conflict in that a particular dealership name includes a different make than some of the rebates credited to it. That is because the way the dealership name is represented in the data does not indicate that it sells other makes. I cross-checked all the instances of this and the data are correct.

Mitsubishi, which had only one rebate is omitted. Subaru, also with a low count, is included. Chevy and Toyota drove the biggest numbers. Tesla is omitted for obvious reasons.

Rebates by dealership in alphabetical order by make and ranked by the number of rebates within make. All data from the Center for Sustainable Energy.

 

The top photo, is a panoramic shot taken by Dawn Henry at our Green Wheels EV Parade and Showcase, showing some of the breadth of EVs on the market, though not all of them are rebate eligible.

CHEAPR Rebates by Dealership Updated

by Barry Kresch

At the EV Club, it is not uncommon for us to have consumers tell us about their dealership experiences as they buy an electric car. These are highly variable. Some dealerships make an effort to sell EVs. Others try to convince customers to buy an ICE vehicle instead. Some have vehicles that are charged and ready for test drives, others not so much. Oftentimes, the customer knows more about the vehicle than the salesperson.

Some dealers make the CHEAPR rebate the seamless experience it is intended to be. Others try and push it onto the consumer to varying degrees. (Just for the record, for a new vehicle CHEAPR incentive, the dealer is supposed to submit the paperwork and the rebate should appear as a credit on the invoice. This “cash on the hood” aspect is the best thing about the program design.)

The approach here is to use the number of rebates awarded as a proxy for EV-friendliness. It does have some limitations in that not every dealer sells CHEAPR eligible vehicles, which are BEVs and PHEVs that have an MSRP of no more than $42,000.  Some of the newer EVs that are showing early signs of success are either completely or mostly above the MSRP cap. Examples are the Ford Mustang Mach-E, Jeep Wrangler PHEV, and Volkswagen ID.4.

Freedom of Information Act request

The data below were obtained via a Freedom of Information Act request to the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection and are from 2021 only, intending to reflect the current state of the market. There were Tesla rebates in 2021, but these are not included in the tables because Tesla sells corporately, and it is safe to say it does want to sell EVs. If a dealership does not appear in any of the tables, it is because there were no rebates associated with it. Some dealerships sell more than one make. We had granular data as to which vehicle model received the rebate, so they a dealership may be assigned to multiple brands accordingly.

There is often a very large gap between the dealers with the strongest performance and most of the rest, as you will readily see.

Toyota

Toyota has been the recent king of CHEAPR rebates with two popular PHEVs that are eligible (RAV4 Prime and Prius Prime). A1 Toyota has been a consistently strong performer. At the other end of the spectrum, New Country Toyota, located in the city (Westport) with the highest per capita EV ownership in the state, awarded a paltry 5 incentives.

 

Hyundai

Hyundai has been more of a factor recently with its Kona and Ioniq lineup. Brandfon and Danbury Hyundai were the standouts.

Chevrolet

All of these rebates are for the Bolt. This benighted vehicle first had the launch of its refreshed model and sibling EUV delayed due to the pandemic. When it was finally introduced last year, it showed stronger results than its predecessor. Then a small number of battery fires, for which the cause proved maddeningly difficult to pin down, ultimately cascaded into a full-blown recall of every Bolt manufactured. According to a recent report in MotorBiscuit.com, which characterizes the Bolt as “doomed,” Chevy has shifted its hopes to its planned EUV version of the Equinox, along with an electrified Silverado. Both of these are 2024 model year vehicles, expected to be on sale in the fall of 2023.

Nissan

The Nissan rebates are for one of the first EVs introduced, namely the Leaf. This BEV has never been a particularly strong seller, which is reflected in generally low rebate counts. Still, there is a considerable spread with Harte leading the pack. Nissan is introducing a new BEV called the Ariya.

Kia

Kia makes both a BEV and PHEV version of its Niro and one dealership that stands above the others.

Honda

Honda pulled the plug on its Clarity PHEV, a vehicle that had received little corporate support over the past couple of years. It is one of the few PHEVs with an electric range of over 40 miles. Westport Honda, which had tremendous success with the Clarity, does not appear on the chart, presumably because what we’re seeing here is the selling off of residual inventory. Honda will not have a replacement electric vehicle until 2024 when it plans to release an EUV called the Prologue.

Subaru

Subaru has one plug-in, the PHEV CrossTrek, which is not a strong seller.

Mini

There is a Mini BEV and PHEV.

Chrysler

Chrysler has been selling the Pacifica PHEV minivan for some years. It has never been a big seller. The vehicle from the company’s sister brand, the Jeep Wrangler PHEV, is meeting with early success but is above the MSRP cap.

Volkswagen

VW has transitioned from its e-Golf to the ID.4, the first of its new generation of BEVs to be sold in this country. Most of the ID.4 trim levels exceed the MSRP cap of the CHEAPR program.

Ford

Ford has made major progress with its strategy of producing electric versions of its iconic Mustang and F150 nameplates. The EUV Mustang Mach-E is above the MSRP cap and is currently supply-constrained. The electric F150 Lightning has yet to begin deliveries. Only the base trim level will qualify for the rebate based on the pre-release announced pricing. Usually, early production focuses on the premium trim levels which are more profitable. The rebates here are for the Fusion Energi PHEV, a low-volume vehicle.

Mitsubishi

Mitsubishi has been selling its Outlander PHEV sport utility vehicle. Reportedly, a success story abroad, it never found much traction here.