I don't know why it took me this long to articulate this thought, but Tesla's charging model is ultimately a trap for themselves:

They rely on other folks to provide services near their charging sites. That's clever, BUT it means they do not make any money from those services.

And that's precisely what keeps gas stations in business. They compete with one another to such an extent that the fuel is sold barely above cost, and the store/car wash/cafe is where they /actually/ make money.

As soon as a big player like Pilot, Loves, whatever rolls out charging en masse they're gonna be able to do the same with electricity.

Tesla, unless they want to learn the ins-and-outs of running convenience stores, won't be able to do that, so the cost of their charging will stay high. They aren't set up to subsidize it with other things.

@TechConnectify do you know anything of the partnerships with Wawa and Royal Farms? Seen them push out Tesla chargers at their locations. This is literally on their property, not just nearby.

@theotherlinh No, but again - this sort of relationship only buys Tesla convenience in site placement.

Perhaps Wawa gives them a cut but... I'm skeptical that's the case.

@bananas I mean, in the end it doesn't matter.

They have to pay for their chargers and the energy they use, as would anyone else. But other people can subsidize that with profits from other business centers.

@TechConnectify Above cost enough that the oil companies make hundreds of billions – At least in the UK, forecourts are often run by the oil companies. But your point stands, Tesla doesn’t generate any of the energy it sells.

@mdonkin Are they actually run by those companies, or are they franchised?

Here in the US, the name on the pumps means very little. That's just who the owners are buying their gas from.

@TechConnectify Ironically, the thing that will enable that to happen in the US is the NACS standard. Things are going to be very different in 10 years.

@xinmyname Oh, for sure! That's why I think this it's ultimately a good thing that we switch.

@TechConnectify

Most charging should be done where you park overnight. I am not sure of the economics but i think a lot of people are charging "in the wild" where it is free or discounted if home charging isn't available.

I think the Gas station Charging is going to be a white elephant, while it will take off at Grocery stores, malls or event parking to attract customers.

In the Midwest Gas Stations are in business as Grocery stores for rural areas

@thesteelrat Oh, to be clear, I think this only needs to (or should, anyway) be a thing along major highways. I /hope/ we are installing cheap Level 2 AC charging infrastructure all over the place because yes, charging at home or work is so, so much better.

But for long-distance charging, I'll bet it looks just like today's truck stops and travel centers.

@TechConnectify @bananas seems like the car sales would subsidize at least a little of that. ;)

@cabbey @bananas Sure, but as soon as their leads on scale are lost, that makes their cars more expensive.

As I said a million times now, automakers also being in the business of selling fuel is just bad, full-stop.

I'm even somewhat concerned by the new joint venture, though at least that has many hands in the pot.

@TechConnectify the types of amenities/distractions at gas stations are loosely coupled in how long they take to complete with how long it takes a pump to fill a car.

Electric cars, with their 6x as long charging stops, will be better suited with other types of attractions surrounding the chargers.

Obviously car washes don't factor into this calculus, but things like a convenience store - no one spends half an hour in a convenience store.

Maybe a sit down restaurant? Or a theater that only shows single episodes of TV shows? Idk, I'm just spitballing bad ideas here.

@_yossi_ The thing is, 30 minute charge times are already a thing of a past.

15 minutes is pretty normal, now, and I expect that to continue improving.

Another reason I think looking at what makes sense /now/ isn't a great idea.

@TechConnectify ah, so looking out 5-10 years into a future build out. Yes, you're correct, should be building with faster charging in mind.

But I can already picture a decades old EV rocking up to a charger and sitting for 45 minutes while societal conventions already expect cars to be in and out in 5-10 minutes. Haha!

@_yossi_ Those cars are relatively fixed in number (or will be, anyway) so they'll be less and less of a concern as time goes on.

Besides, it's already a thing we deal with. Nobody likes seeing a Bolt at a full EA station!

@TechConnectify They (Pilot/whoever) will need to adjust their strategy somewhat too.

5 minutes to gas up means you have time to grab a bag of chips and a drink.

15+ minutes means you might want to sit inside, get fresh food, use Wi-Fi, etc. also you need 3x the charging spots compared to gas stations.

Your general sentiment is right. In 10 years nobody should expect Tesla to be running any charging stations. Even if their car business is still around.

@TechConnectify cars live a surprisingly long time. Just this summer I upgraded from my 2000 civic to a 2010 Prius. The civic still runs, maybe not great anymore, but with a little elbow grease it's still a very easy car to keep running.

@_yossi_ Sure, but 10-year-old cars aren't getting made anymore. Because they're 10 years old.

That's what I mean by those cars are fixed in number. You won't need to cater to all that many of them once EVs are the norm.

@thesteelrat @TechConnectify we're already seeing charging stations deployed at grocery stores; I'd expect to see it deployed in rest stops and to see more rest stops become like the Oases in Canada, where you have fuel, coffee/donuts (Tim Hortons), and usually some other food options. Take a bit and have a coffee while you charge.

@ben_zen @thesteelrat Grocery stores are on of the few places I think medium-speed (~50 kW) charging makes sense. You might be able to take care of your needs that way if you can't charge at home.

Still, though, charging at home is infinitely better. IMHO, we should be fixing that problem rather than forcing folks into spending more than they need to propping up another company.

@TechConnectify on the negative side, gas cars are saddled with a legacy of no chips, no authentication protocol to verify that the fuel is properly licensed. It's just a hole that you pour a 𝑟𝑒𝑐𝑢𝑟𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑟𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑛𝑢𝑒 𝑠𝑡𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑚 into which is fatally un-tied to the proprietary manufacturer.

Since then, inkjet printers have been invented. The switch to electric cars provides a golden opportunity to re-invent the revenue model for cars, turning the entire fleet into something more valuable.

@rotopenguin welcome to dystopia

@TechConnectify @thesteelrat absolutely agreed. I wasn't thinking of this as an "instead", but I can see where it'd be taken as such.

My apartment complex has some chargers in the garage, but it's still limited spaces that require people to re-park regularly; hopefully that changes with time.

@ben_zen @thesteelrat I'm hoping people start seeing the wisdom of power-sharing. You can easily put 10 chargers in 10 spots with only ~10 kW behind them because, on average, only a few will be charging at once.

It's much more important to make charging more accessible than it is to make it fast, especially when it alleviates the need to shuffle cars around.

@TechConnectify Onve charging becomes that ubiquitous does Tesla even need to be in the charger game anymore? It was a solution to the check and egg problem.

As you pointed out it’s not a profitable business. So what advantage is there to maintaining it then? Maybe sell it off?

@foobarsoft They certainly won't /need/ to be, but whether they'll want to keep it up I don't know.

If they're undercut on energy price, though, they'll have no reason not to abandon it.

@TechConnectify some Bucc-ee’s (massive road stops in/around Texas) already have superchargers on site.

@TechConnectify my feeling w/o evidence is that the convenience store group will have a bit of learning to do here, as charge times aren't the same as gas-up times... And no one wants to walk around a 7-11 for 20 minutes.

But the truck stops of the world are mostly there already. Truck stops already have to deal with long-stops.

@kilpatds Agreed, though don't discount progress in real-world charge times.

Then again, that's somewhat undercut by the massive batteries some EVs have these days.

@TechConnectify I'm sure you're aware of the GM/EVgo & Pilot/Flying J project that happens to basically be what you're talking about (although I haven't seen anything of that at the Loves/Flying J here in Cheyenne yet) and there isn't really much public news about where the rollout is at. (There's some internal stock stuff like EVgo saying they've dropped off all of the parts to Pilot)

@DasGanon Yeah, I'm eagerly awaiting more news on that. I've seen some pics of a site about to go online, though

@TechConnectify Tesla will likely continue to vertically integrate charging infra tech into their supply chain to run stations with lower margins than competitors will.

@jazaval Sure, but in theory (and actually in-practice in many gas stations) you could run recharging at /negative/ margin if your other business makes sufficient money.

That's kind of my whole point.

@TechConnectify Probably right, but I wonder if fast-charging most EVs is actually too cheap for this to matter — at least for people on long trips who usually charge at home.

For those customers, the experience of the charger and its location — how nice/convenient it is to spend 30 minutes there — is probably more important than whether the electricity costs $15 or $12.

Of course, the bigger the battery, or the more you use DC fast-charging, the more a price difference starts to matter.

@marcoarment My gut says once signs that actually advertise charging cost are normalized (which, perhaps won't happen but time will tell) people will still view it more of a commodity than anything else and will look for the cheapest charge.

But, I agree with you that niceties of the site will be a large factor. And personally, I don't think Tesla has a winning formula there (though others disagree with me).

@jazaval Put more plainly, most gas stations exist as a ploy to get people into the convenience store to by some food, lotto, booze, whatever - where the real money is made.

Tesla cannot do this. They can, at best, offer charging purely at cost. Their best hope is that their vertical integration reduces the cost of each charger to the point they can hang on, but the moment there's a competitor that undercuts them sufficiently because they can /also/ sell them whatever else... it's bad for Tesla

@TechConnectify are companies like Love’s really going to manage the upfront cost of DC charging infrastructure? I guess I have no idea what the relative cost of a new diesel station is though.

@jazaval Given that most gas stations have a big cost Tesla doesn't - land acquisition - I suspect handling the cost of chargers isn't actually that problematic for them.

And (amazingly) new gas stations are still getting built. I, too, am unsure of the startup costs there but selling liquid fuel still involves a heckuva lot of specialty equipment which I'm sure ain't cheap.

@TechConnectify @marcoarment Will it be road-sign based like gasoline, or will drivers trust their in-car/app-based navigation to direct them?

@graemek @marcoarment I personally really do not want us using the car's infotainment screen like that. Not just because it's my personal preference not to, but because there are loads of... steering opportunities there that give me the heebie jeebies.

We don't actually need to reinvent the wheel, here.

@graemek Also, as was said elsewhere in this thread, is it really a great idea to hide away EV chargers?

Imagine how much more confident the average person would be in the adoption of electric vehicles if they could actually see where they can be charged.

I didn't notice the EVgo station that popped up near me. Despite driving by it all the time, I saw no sign of it being installed or anything. It was just... suddenly there in the Plugshare app.

This is kinda bonkers, no?

@TechConnectify @marcoarment We don’t need to, no, but I’m not sure that battle isn’t already lost. I’m not sure about Google Maps, but Apple Maps already communicates with my car and automatically adds waypoints for chargers for me on navigation. Convenience wins over all for most consumers.

That feature was a surprise to me, for sure. I’ve DC charged my car exactly one time in the year I’ve owned it. I had no idea it could do that already.

@graemek Fair, but I'll reiterate my broadest point:

I don't see the band-aids of today as the way we should move forward.

Maybe you can make the case that built-in route-planning will minimize the number of charging locations we'll need out there. But honestly, I don't agree with that.

Right now, charging isn't ubiquitous so it needs special considerations. Just as gas-powered cars did at the turn of the century. I'll be very surprised (and disappointed) if this is still the case in 10 years

@TechConnectify @marcoarment I don't think existing gas stations really have a winning formula either; they're ill suited to have people waiting around extended periods of time.

Seems like this is better suited for a fast food chain or possibly a grocery chain. Though in my neighborhood the biggest charging station is in a Target parking lot, complete with an in-store coffebux.

Thinking about it, I'm a little surprised this isn't something Walmart has gone after.

@donw @marcoarment Your run-of-the-mill in-town gas station doesn't, no.

But truck stops are 95% there. Make them a little bit nicer and boom. Done.

@TechConnectify I've gone to a lot of NY-region Superchargers over the years, and some EA chargers recently. Tesla has a significant leg up around here, but they still vary a lot.

What I always want is a travel plaza with multiple options on how I spend my time and what/whether I eat, and a bathroom I can use without feeling obligated to stay or spend money.

What we often get is a mall/Target/Walmart parking lot, or a sit-down restaurant's parking lot with nothing else in walking distance.

@TechConnectify Obviously, I don't represent everyone, but I'd MUCH rather stop at a nice travel plaza on the side of the highway than drive 3 miles out of the way to a Wal-Mart, even if the charge at the travel plaza costs an extra $5 or whatever.

@marcoarment Oh, I agree with you there.

I've found that most of the conversations regarding this have misaligned frameworks - I'm thinking of the way I suspect things will be 10 years down the road.

Tesla's situation is the best EV solution /right now/ but I think this reality makes a lot of people think "well, just copy what they're doing" without looking more broadly at what other industries are doing. Some of that, I think, is outright aversion to engaging with ideas born in the past.

@TechConnectify Oh I was thinking community, since there was discussion of price advertising. I don't think most consumers gassing up at truck stops are price sensitive the way neighborhood folks are, since they're choosing convenience over taking an exit and hunting.

@donw I dunno, most of the truck stops around here pay for billboards miles away which advertise their price.

@marcoarment Somewhat tangentially related, I had a convo at Open Sauce with two Tesla employees.

Neither one knew about the charging speeds Hyundai/Kia E-GMP has attained, and it was also humorous when I brought up the touchscreen control for the glovebox.

"It reduces BOM!" I was told excitedly, and when I said

"but you still need an actuator. Why not just use a manual latch?" the response was a completely surprised

"oh"

It, uh, very strongly reinforced some of my opinions, gotta tell ya.

@kazriko @TechConnectify @marcoarment One my of (wacky) business ideas is a set of aftermarket manual controls for various appliances that only sell with touchscreens these days. I was thinking mostly appliances (knobs for stoves, ovens, etc and manual selector knobs for bluetooth connections) but it could work for the non-safety functionality in a car too.

@TechConnectify The thing is, gas stations need attendants to hit the switch in case of an accident. Those folks might as well do other things as well while on-site. Charging stations don't need that kind of babysitting. So a zero employee model will likely work just fine.

@ccdudley85 Whether it "works" and whether people actually want that experience are very different questions.

@TechConnectify Hum, I'm happy to avoid the gas station. Back when I did go I used to wish someone would just drop by my place at night to top off the tank. The gas station experience is pretty overrated I think.

@ccdudley85 I have charged my EV at night in the outskirts of a parking lot. Don't really like that.

I charge at home mostly, but when I'm out on a road trip, I just want a normal place to charge.

@ccdudley85 And by normal, I mean staffed, well-lit, with bathrooms, food, and windshield squeegees.

We really didn't have to reinvent the wheel. Tesla did because it's easier for them in a lot of ways - but I don't view today's band-aids as good. Far from it.

I am eagerly looking forward to the days recharging at facilities like truck stops is normal.

@TechConnectify a company is going to release a full color e ink monitor please let me know what you think of. It seems cool https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/paperlike-color-world-first-color-e-ink-monitor/coming_soon