Elon Musk’s polygonal pickup is a polarizing sales flop that's missed the billionaire’s volume goal by a staggering 84%. And there’s no sign that things are improving.
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Elon Musk’s polygonal pickup is a polarizing sales flop that's missed the billionaire’s volume goal by a staggering 84%. And there’s no sign that things are improving.
T
he list of famous auto industry flops is long and storied, topped by stinkers like Ford’s Edsel and exploding Pinto and General Motors’s unsightly Pontiac Aztek crossover SUV. Even John Delorean’s sleek, stainless steel DMC-12, iconic from its role in the “Back To The Future” films, was a sales dud that drove the company to bankruptcy.
Elon Musk’s pet project, the dumpster-driving Tesla Cybertruck, now tops that list.
After a little over a year at market, sales of the 6,600-pound vehicle, priced from $82,000, are laughably below what Musk predicted. Its lousy reputation for quality–with eight recalls in the past 13 months, the latest for
body panelsthat fall off–and polarizing look made it a
punchline for
comedians. Unlike past auto flops that just looked ridiculous or sold badly, Musk’s truck is also a focal point for global Tesla protests spurred by the billionaire’s job-slashing DOGE role and MAGA politics.
“It’s right up there with Edsel,” said Eric Noble, president of consultancy CARLAB and a professor at ArtCenter College of Design in Pasadena, California (Tesla design chief Franz von Holzhausen, who styled Cybertruck for Musk, is a graduate of its famed transportation design program). “It’s a huge swing and a huge miss.”