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When legislators pass laws - they keep a history of the discussions as to what the purpose and goals of the laws that they create are supposed to achieve. The legislative history for dealership protections indicates the objectives were to prevent Ford manufacturers from competing with Ford dealerships ... and General Motors manufacturers from competing with General Motors dealerships. This old law was never designed to prevent a brand new manufacturer from coming into existence . But if a manufacturer comes into existence obviously it can't create a nationwide network of dealerships right from the get go because that would destroy all of their capital and prevent any new manufacturer from ever coming into existence . I don't know why something so simple is so hard for people to understand.

If legislators want to include Tesla who never had dealerships (and in essence force them to create dealerships) ... & put Tesla under the same umbrella of this old legislation, it is within their power to write such legislation. But it bugs me when the system uses the courts to in essence create new legislation - rather than interpret the laws that are on the books already. It is within the Court's power to say to the plaintiff dealerships that the old law was designed to protect company "a" dealership, from company "a" manufacturer. If the legal system goes so far as to actually hear this case - then I just hope the court makes the right decision. In a perfect world the courts would say this old law doesn't fit with the Tesla type of scenario.
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Imagine if Apple could not sell ipads directly to customers except thru BESTBUY.

 

well, except through everyone who wants to sell them you mean? By doing so creating competition and lowering the prices? Thats what you mean?

In Europe we have factory owned dealerships (Toyota too) and this is what you get from them:
- Better service
- Higher prices for service (no discounts on car parts or service, we pay double or more than what you pay in US for same parts).
- Higher prices for cars (no discounts other than official).

To me it is hillarious that people dont want dealers to exist and want to let companies to create monopolies. It is insanity.

Yeah, "Apple" model is better for the customer than buying Samsung at 500 different online shops to get the best price. I guess we shouldnt have Amazon and Ebay at all, lets just buy everything through official Sony, Samsung and Apple stores.

Insane thinking.

 

EU has been lately cracking on car distributors that try to fix prices and forbid their dealers to compete... and this is basically what Tesla owned stores would do - they would never compete on price of service or cars.

 

Companies can not really create monopolies when there is a Honda, Hyundai/Kia/Ford/Chevy on the same street. Direct sales can co-exist with dealers. North Carolina Wants to Ban Tesla... And Only Tesla - YouTube

 

Which is why the franchise protection laws came to be here. To keep manufacturer stores from pushing the independent ones out, and then raising prices.

But Tesla doesn't have any franchise stores at all to be a threat to. They don't want to franchise stores, and they shouldn't have to be forced to to sell their product. What the dealer associations and the states are doing is the equivalent of McDonald franchise owners forcing Wendy's to set up franchises.

This could lead to Tesla to overcharging, if they remained the only game in town for a BEV, but they aren't. Audi and BMW, IIRC, both have or will have a BEV available, and after seeing Tesla's success they might increase their efforts on that front.