An article I read recently made a good point about Tesla's margins that I hadn't considered before.
Tesla is selling at retail directly to consumers, whereas most dealerships sell wholesale to dealerships. Of course their margins will be higher, but they have to eat the cost of their retail infrastructure that other manufacturers don't.
In that way, their higher margins aren't that much of a benefit because some of the cost is just getting shifted into SG&A. It was interesting because I had never heard it brought up but it made a lot of sense.
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[ 2.7 ms ] story [ 17.1 ms ] threadTesla is selling at retail directly to consumers, whereas most dealerships sell wholesale to dealerships. Of course their margins will be higher, but they have to eat the cost of their retail infrastructure that other manufacturers don't.
In that way, their higher margins aren't that much of a benefit because some of the cost is just getting shifted into SG&A. It was interesting because I had never heard it brought up but it made a lot of sense.