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Tesla Motors opened its first dealership in Santa Monica, California, on Friday, attracting a gaggle of reporters.
The location of the site in the tony Westwood neighbourhood reflects the high-end shopping experience it intends to create for the flashy $109,000 (£55,389) Tesla Roadster. The next store, slated to open in San Carlos, California, in a couple of months, will be set up to appeal to the Silicon Valley tech elite.
The company told the Associated Press that it is impressed with demand: it has taken 600 orders for the Roadster and has a waiting list of another 400. CEO Elon Musk owns the first one produced.
The fancy showroom near Beverly Hills takes its inspiration from Apple stores, Musk said. "The Apple stores have worked out well. It's a fantastic consumer experience," Musk told AutoWeek. "We wanted a non-traditional automotive experience, and we have it."
The company plans to make a luxury sedan next year called the Whitestar, which will come in two versions: an all-electric model that will run entirely on its lithium ion battery pack, and a range-extended vehicle that will also use liquid fuel to extend its range.
The Roaster will have a range of 220 miles per charge and the mileage equivalent of 135 miles per gallon. The car's sex appeal is rooted in the electric motor as well: with powerful torque, it can go from standing still to 60mph in less than four seconds.
With its racy Roadster, Tesla can lay claim to putting all-electric cars back on the map. But it certainly won't be alone for long. Audi recently said it will have an all-electric car in ten years, and General Motors is expected to bring out the Chevy Volt in 2010.
Then there's Think Global with its electric town cars. They're only available in Norway, where the company is based, but there are plans afoot to expand in Europe and the US.
The first two engineering prototypes of the Tesla Roadster.
The battery consists of approximately 6,800 lithium-ion battery cells (your notebook computer probably has six similar cells). It has been designed so that a "runaway thermal reaction," or fire, won't occur if one battery cell overheats. The car chassis is built in England but the battery comes from Taiwan.
The car is shipped separately from the battery.
Note the smooth surface of the car's underside -- electric cars are much simpler than gas cars, hence the lack of pipes and grease.
The interior of one of the prototypes -- some of the fit and finish details have changed, but this pretty much is how the final version looks. The company got an exemption on putting in advanced air bags for now.
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