As far as recent car news goes, it is more than fair to say that the recent unveiling of Tesla’s new truck is definitively the best and more entertaining piece of news to come out of the automotive industry this year. While of course the latest innovations in areas of the car industry like the electric movement in automotives itself and novated leasing have proven to be riveting (to say the least), it is the first big reveal of Tesla’s upcoming pickup truck – called a Cybertruck – that has been a frontrunner in headlines around the globe. While the pickup truck has indeed been a revolutionary reveal not only for Tesla, but the electric evolution of automotives, that is not the reason it was the highlight in car news recently.
Elon Musk – the powerhouse behind Tesla – says that the company has already received over 200,000 orders for the electric pickup truck in the first three days of its launch alone. This is exciting, on the one hand, and interesting, on the other. Why? Well, the highly-anticipated reveal of the futuristic automotive manufacturer’s first pickup truck came with some entertaining deviations from the expected on-stage pitch presented by Elon Musk himself. So, what where these entertaining plot twists, and what do they have to do with the order numbers of the pickup truck in the days following its launch?
“A truck you can take a sledgehammer to”
One of the most riveting moments in Musk’s presentation was when he revealed that the new pickup truck was “really tough…a truck you can take a sledgehammer to”. Indeed, on stage his associate took a sledgehammer to the pickup truck. It was a remarkably impressive testament to the fact that when Tesla builds a vehicle and talks the talk, the company really delivers by walking the walk. Unless you had seen it with your own eyes, you would never have believed that the pickup truck had been violently hit with a sledgehammer.
The unexpected plot twist that ensued in laughter
And then, in a move that resulted in spirited laughter from the crowd, the next show of how tough the pickup truck was, was the action of throwing a baseball at its window. Talking about the armoured glass windows, Musk was left in mild shock when the baseball shattered the glass. Telling his associate to throw the baseball at the back window on the same side of the pickup truck (an effort to prove it was a one-off incident), the back window also shattered. The crowd laughed, and Musk responded by saying something along the lines of, “at least it didn’t go straight through, right? We will work on that”.
What the failed launch meant for Tesla in the aftermath
A failed launch and yet a highly amusing one at the same time, it was uncertain how Tesla would fare in the immediate aftermath. Tesla’s share price dropped 6% after the unveiling. To put that into perspective, that is roughly the equivalent of effectively removing $768 million dollars from Musk’s net worth in just twenty-four hours. This might seem like bad news, and sure, maybe it is, but the quick jokes and viral memes that resulted from the launch have actually raised interest in the Cybertruck. Tesla shares have risen back to around their usual current rate in the days since. As for if the Cybertruck will sell as well as Tesla and Musk believe it will, that remains to be seen, but if the gifs and memes are anything to go by, we can likely (if not almost certainly) expect it to be a strongly performing model.
