this post was submitted on 15 Mar 2025
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Summary

A survey of 100,000 Germans found that 94% refuse to buy a Tesla, signaling a major crisis for the company.

Tesla’s German sales dropped 70% in early 2025 after a 41% decline in 2024, despite overall EV sales rising.

Analysts attribute the slump to CEO Elon Musk’s far-right political endorsements, including promoting the AfD party and making Nazi-related gestures. Musk is under European investigation for political meddling.

With Tesla’s reputation plummeting, industry experts predict further losses in Germany’s competitive EV market.

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[–] Underwire@lemmy.world 94 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

It is already dumb for a German to buy an American car. It is like a French buying an American wine.

[–] doeknius_gloek@discuss.tchncs.de 57 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Sadly our car industry slept way too long on electric vehicles and instead doubled down on combustion engines, even by fraudulent practices (e.g. Dieselgate).

Teslas were by far the best EVs for a long time. Nowadays, not so much.

[–] A_norny_mousse@feddit.org 10 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

Teslas were by far the best EVs for a long time

Were they though? Almost immediately after he stole the company from its founders/creators quality went down. But maybe there was enough residual quality to last him for a few years.

Anyhow, your point stands. Nowadays there's plenty more to choose from and what then was innovative just isn't anymore.

[–] GreyEyedGhost@lemmy.ca 25 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

Okay, Elon Musk is a giant asshole, but not so big that it warps reality around it. Musk provided money and became chairman of Tesla in Jan 2004. The first production vehicle rolled out in 2005. All Teslas were produced after Musk joined Tesla. And while it could be argued that he did a hostile takeover of Tesla, usually theft doesn't include piles of cash going to the victim.

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[–] DrFistington@lemmy.world 11 points 3 weeks ago

I mean, it technically may be true, but that's due to the complete lack of a viable competitor. Teslas are cheap, poorly made death traps. If you use auto pilot your basically being used as an unpaid crash test dummy. If you like being taken advantage of, then a Tesla is for you

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[–] ninjakttty@lemmy.world 21 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

As someone from Northern California might not have been the greatest analogy :)

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judgment_of_Paris_(wine)

[–] oo1@lemmings.world 3 points 3 weeks ago

Looks like some elitist crap to me. Who the fuck buys the "best" especially in something like wine thats replete with elitist bullsit and nobbery to exagerate perceptions of scarcity and create an "investment". its a fucking consumable.

99% of the people in France can get perfectly good French wine for a handful of euros without importing from USA.

Coudn't give a fuck about the other 1%.

[–] Naich@lemmings.world 7 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

There's plenty of really good American wines.

[–] MrFinnbean@lemmy.world 11 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

But you can buy just as good and better wines cheaper and locally if you live in France.

[–] oo1@lemmings.world 3 points 3 weeks ago

yep, value for money.
Importing is a waste of diesel fuel even without any tariffs - if you have decent domestic production.

[–] muddyuk@lemm.ee 9 points 3 weeks ago

There are - sadly I won’t be buying any for at least 4 years and will be buying European.

[–] A_norny_mousse@feddit.org 8 points 3 weeks ago

nobody claimed otherwise

[–] jaybone@lemmy.world 87 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

“Nazi-related gestures”

[–] heavydust 58 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (2 children)

makes nazi salute

"Hitler did nothing wrong"

"Oh, he's not a bad guy, he's misunderstood."

[–] A_norny_mousse@feddit.org 14 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

Best justification so far: he was just so happy, so in the moment!

🤔 When's the last time you made an "accidental" Heil Hitler just because you were pumped about something?

[–] 467265654C75696769 4 points 3 weeks ago

...and do it twice, just in case the first "accident" wasn't enough.

[–] liquidparasyte@pawb.social 5 points 3 weeks ago

Oh what an improvement, they actually mentioned the hate movement this time

[–] Threeme2189 3 points 3 weeks ago

I did notsee related gestures 🙄

[–] FuglyDuck@lemmy.world 54 points 3 weeks ago
[–] mercano@lemmy.world 29 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

If the Tesla board of directors was being responsible to shareholders, they’d have recognized the damage the public perception of Elon is doing to the company and either have him rein it in or outright remove him. However, Elon’s gotten a number of his cronies onto the board, so I don’t think it’s happening unless the shareholders vote out the current board.

[–] kiku@feddit.org 24 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

It's also weird because if they get rid of Elon then people would start looking at the actual fundamentals of Tesla which would lead to a much much lower stock price. In December, Tesla was valued at roughly the same as the rest of the worlds auto manufacturers combined, despite selling only 3% of the worlds cars in 2023.

[–] BilboBargains@lemmy.world 8 points 3 weeks ago

It's an aspirational brand that is the result of a carefully curated public image. Tesla are notable for their litigation propensity, dubious technical claims and avoidance of benchmarking, e.g., JD Power.

[–] SilentStorms@lemmy.dbzer0.com 24 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

That’s pretty wild considering the rise of AfD support there.

I wonder if Elon’s endorsement was a detriment to their election campaign.

[–] madjo@feddit.nl 32 points 3 weeks ago

AfD voters don't care about the environment and the climate.

[–] LazyGit@feddit.org 20 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I mean AfD made it pretty clear they are against Tesla when trying to stop the Tesla plant in Germany.

Not sure how their brains work, maybe they don’t. 🤷🏼‍♂️

[–] andallthat@lemmy.world 4 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

why? Elon supports AfD and I think he's making it pretty clear that he's against Tesla too

[–] pyre@lemmy.world 2 points 3 weeks ago

if he wasn't he wouldn't force them to make a truck that's as disfigured as his body.

[–] fluffy@feddit.org 14 points 3 weeks ago

Well, they are afraid of electric vehicles, they want the good old polluting combustion engine.

[–] A_norny_mousse@feddit.org 4 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

I wonder if Elon’s endorsement was a detriment to their election campaign.

No, definitely not. But imho it didn't shift the needle upwards either. They've been on the rise for a long time and there was no jump during this election.

But the next election in Europe might look different.

And there's a lot more to be said about American-based social media and far-right populist movements influencing our own flavors of the same for many years now.

[–] SleafordMod@feddit.uk 21 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

94% say they won't buy a Tesla car

A still image of Matthew McConaughey's character from the movie The Wolf of Wall Street. The caption reads "you gotta pump those numbers up; those are rookie numbers".

[–] Corkyskog 2 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)
[–] SleafordMod@feddit.uk 3 points 3 weeks ago

AfD got 21% in the election though, higher than just 6%. I think it's like someone else in this thread said - the right don't want to buy Teslas because electric cars are seen as "woke", while the left don't want to buy Teslas because they don't like Musk.

[–] paintedsunflowers@feddit.nl 17 points 3 weeks ago

I hope this is more than just a temporary movement!

[–] PlausibleDupont@jlai.lu 17 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

The only way to get your money back is to set your car on fire these days

[–] urandom@lemmy.world 5 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

The option to drive it until it falls apart is still on the table though. A car shouldn't be treated as an investment opportunity

[–] CafecitoHippo@lemm.ee 6 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Yeah but then you'd be stuck driving it for another couple weeks.

[–] froh42@lemmy.world 3 points 3 weeks ago

What a burn. The Tesla might even catch fire from this comment alone.

[–] mytradingidea@lemm.ee 14 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

This is how we should treat all products and services coming from the US. Promote the European market for a stronger Europe. We have failed here in recent decades. Let's buy EU products for a better future for our youngest.

[–] jabjoe@feddit.uk 12 points 3 weeks ago

Also services. Including Google, Apple, Netflix, Amazon, Microsoft, etc. Those American tech monopolies are now a problem for all to see.

[–] MemmingenFan923@feddit.org 10 points 3 weeks ago

The left don't buy Teslas because of Elons right political views and his salute.

The right don't buy Teslas because Teslas being electrical vehicles. Electrical vehicles are considered as left / woke in Germany.

[–] pelespirit 9 points 3 weeks ago
[–] Denixen@feddit.nu 8 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

Neintyfour percent say no. Doesn't this mean like most of AfD voters also say nein?

[–] joostjakob@lemmy.world 32 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

As I said in the other place this article was posted: the source seems to be an online reader survey from t-online.be. That means the scientific value of this is pretty low. For decent surveys, you need a random sample. In this case, you need to be a visitor of t-online, and you decide for yourself that you want to participate. That's already enough to skew results. Add to that that there's a lot of online activism against Tesla (for obvious reasons), so the poll could have been partly hijacked. Such a low number of people who don't care or haven't heard about Tesla going rogue is not realistic anyway. There's a lot of people who are weird, contrarian or simply avoid all news.

[–] Denixen@feddit.nu 4 points 3 weeks ago

Good point. I thought numbers were a bit too extreme.

[–] silver13@lemmy.world 8 points 3 weeks ago

Because they have been fed massive propaganda against EVs for years, they would never buy one anyway.

[–] A_norny_mousse@feddit.org 2 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

Vierundneunzig, bitte.

Since they got much more than 6% during the last election, and 82% of all people voted, yes.

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