Tesla Motor Corp. (NASDAQ: TSLA) produced 18,345 vehicles in the second quarter, which was a disappointment. It hopes to do better in future quarters when it will, among other things, need to fill hundreds of thousands of orders for the new Model 3. Production is not Tesla’s only problem. In some parts of the country, it has next to none of its highway-side Superchargers. In other states it has an abundance.
California not only has a large population of rich people. The state also has the largest percentage of residents who live in cities. According to the 24/7 Wall St. analysis, States Where the Most People Live in Cities, California ranks in first place among the 50 states in terms of people who live in cities at 95%. Tesla has 42 Superchargers in California. As Tesla ownership grows, that number will spike higher.
Tesla has all but given up on some markets for the time being, which makes sense. It has one Supercharger in West Virginia, for example. The state not only is poor, but it is sparsely populated. It ranks 48th on the 24/7 Wall St population concentration list at 48.7%.
Whatever the population is from state to state and city to city, Tesla has lowered the chances that it will sell cars in places with low populations and vast square mileage. It does not have any Superchargers in North Dakota, where people sometimes have to drive hundreds of miles from one place to another.
According to data on the Tesla website, there are 661 Superchargers in the United States, with more coming soon. Research firm Fuel Economy puts the total count of gasoline retailers in America at 168,000. Game, set and match to gas-fueled cars. If Tesla wants to sell 500,000 cars by the end of the decade, as it has forecast, even 1,000 Superchargers will not be enough.
Another hurdle Tesla faces is that apparently owners of the new, inexpensive Model 3 will have to pay for Supercharger access, based on comments from Tesla founder Elon Musk.
Whether it is a paid service or not, Tesla does not only have to overcome its production charges. It also has to have places people can “fill up.”
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