Elon Musk is facing more difficulties at Tesla, after an EV rival admitted it was successfully targetting Tesla owners fed up with Musk’s controversial activities.
Reuters reported that a Polestar executive has admitted that nearly half of Polestar’s global sales in the quarter through March came from hefty discounts targeting disgruntled Tesla owners. Polestar has reported a 76 percent surge in deliveries in that period.
It comes after Tesla continues to pay the price for Elon Musk’s role at DOGE, his support for the far right, and his political interventions in other countries.
Some investors have openly called for Musk’s removal from Tesla.
Tesla trouble
Tesla itself is experiencing a consumer backlash after it reported a 13 percent drop in vehicle sales in the first three months of the year, making it the electric vehicle maker’s worst quarter since 2022.
What made this sales drop even more worrying for Elon Musk, is that the decline came despite deep discounts, zero financing and other incentives, and growing concern at some of Tesla’s outdated models compared to its rivals.
And the sales decline came despite US President Donald Trump turning the White House driveway into a Tesla showroom, when he publicly purchased a red Model S costing $80,000 for his staff to use.
Teslas is also facing ongoing protests at Tesla stores and service centres in the US, and EVs and charging stations are being attacked and vandalised.
Tesla’s stock has dropped 32 percent so far this year from poor sales, as well as record numbers of trade-ins from unhappy customers.
Tesla is due to report its financial results for the first quarter of 2025 later this month on 22 April, which no doubt will be closely scrutinised by investors and Wall Street.
Tesla started on Thursday selling its EV cars in the oil rich nation of Saudi Arabia.
Polestar benefits
Into this comes the news that Polestar has reported a 76 percent surge in deliveries, and an executive said that nearly half of that came from hefty discounts targeting disgruntled Tesla owners.
The Polestar offer reportedly gives Tesla owners in the US discounts of up to $20,000 towards a Polestar 3 lease, and this helped power sales to 12,304 vehicles in the first three months, Polestar’s US head of sales, Jordan Hofmann, confirmed to Reuters.
“We piloted a conquest campaign in late February. Based on the positive response we ran a new campaign for the month of March. We are currently running a similar campaign for April,” a spokesperson for Polestar told Reuters.
The offer is valid for its Polestar 3, which is produced in a Volvo Cars factory in South Carolina.
“The numbers speak for themselves. This week saw some of the highest order days for Polestar 3, and the response to our Tesla Conquest Offer has been incredible,” Jordan Hofmann, Polestar’s head of sales in the US, also said in a LinkedIn post a month ago.
Polestar was acquired by Volvo in 2015 and is a Swedish EV maker, but is now mostly owned by China’s Geely and an investment entity belonging to Geely’s founder.
