Only weeks after announcing a new $35,000 Model 3 vehicle and the move to an online-only shopping experience, Tesla announced a three percent price increase for certain vehicles and plans to keep some brick and mortar stores open.
In a recent blog post, Elon Musk’s Tesla announced a change of course to plans it announced just weeks ago. Breitbart News previously reported on Tesla’s plans to shut down their brick and mortar stores in favor of an online-only sales model; this announcement was made as the company announced a new $35,000 Model 3 vehicle. Now it appears that not only will certain retail stores be staying open but vehicle prices are increasing overall.
“Over the past two weeks we have been closely evaluating every single Tesla retail location, and we have decided to keep significantly more stores open than previously announced as we continue to evaluate them over the course of several months,” Tesla said in the blog post. This announcement comes a few days after the Wall Street Journal reported that some Tesla store landlords were keeping the company on the hook for its lease agreements.
The post further states: “A few stores in high visibility locations that were closed due to low throughput will be reopened, but with a smaller Tesla crew. In addition, there are another 20% of locations that are under review, and depending on their effectiveness over the next few months, some will be closed and some will remain open.”
Of course, closing these stores was a cost-cutting measure for the company in the first place, meaning that the firm — which has been steadily laying off staff — will have to find the money to continue operating the stores. This has resulted in a rise in Tesla vehicle prices. The blog post states: “As a result of keeping significantly more stores open, Tesla will need to raise vehicle prices by about 3% on average worldwide. In other words, we will only close about half as many stores, but the cost savings are therefore only about half.”
It should be noted that this price increase is not being applied to the company’s new $35,000 Model 3 vehicle but will apply to the more expensive variants of the cars as well as the Model S and Model X.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan or email him at lnolan@breitbart.com
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