"Our example ($76,865, as tested) was among the “early salable” units and it was a QC shambles, a real bed soiling. "
Second best observation I’ve read recently, after seeing a public figure’s aimless bloviating described as “an air salad with vapor croutons and nullity dressing.”
The upholstery is 100% vegan leather, made from only the finest vegans.
The whole thing is gold.
I brought the R1T to Cars & Coffee to get some hot takes, especially with regard to its perpetually smiling, squeaky-toy face. Verdict? People love it—Beardsley McHipster, Liv Alone Schreiber, Lady Jodhpur, Ulysses S. YouTube. Good Lord, are these people ready for something different.
Damned Eddie Grant earworm…screw that guy!
Wow. That guy has a cool job. But it was cringe worthy torture reading his review. He needs to dial it way down and get an editor
Dan Neil’s WSJ column is one of the worst for auto reviews. It’s clearly written for people who have little knowledge of cars and barely any interest in them.
Before I stopped reading them altogether, the formula was as follows:
50%: long tangents on stuff that might interest people with little interest in cars. Eg, a pickup “review” begins with a long explanation of section 179 and accelerated depreciation, while a Volvo review deals with the Geely takeover and its ramifications.
40%: regurgitate the spec sheet. Power, acceleration, fuel economy, dimensions, tech, etc.
10%: a throwaway line or two on what it’s actually like to drive the bloody thing.
Well, yeah, consider what the typical WSJ reader is looking for, and it makes sense why this isn’t a review written for car people.
I’m honestly shocked the article itself wasn’t more negative, considering how often the WSJ takes the opportunity to crap on EVs, given the brand’s increasingly political persuasions.
I believe I have a higher than average interest in cars, yet it only goes so deep.
My eyes start glazing over when the narrative starts swerving over into how the Mazda Uvula has a slight performance edge over the Hyundai Rhombus because the Uvula has more pistons per Newton-meter of rear seat hip room.
I dunno…I was entertained, which was more interesting than anything already over-covered on the Rivian. (thanks for the non-paywall version).
Watch Motor Trend video series how they drove those cross country including lots of off-roading. Two different guys for every stretch and all of them seemed to be in love with R1T.
No, you’re not the target reader. Dan Neil’s target reader is apparently someone who sees the headline of a Ford F250 review and wonders “umm what’s a F250?”
I’m glad you asked dear reader: ever since Danish physicist Hans Christian Ørsted isolated Aluminum in 1825…
The company attributed the loss largely to a $7.6 billion loss from its investment in electric automaker Rivian Automotive. Rivian, into which Amazon led a $700 million investment in 2019, has seen its stock plummet more than 75% since its blockbuster November 2021 IPO.
https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/28/tech/amazon-earnings-loss/index.html
Shifting the blame it seems to another company they invested in. Everyone else is getting better at the online sales game. I also do not like the way Amazon see’s what products sell and then using their data monster and deep pockets make the product a generic product themselves to sell. This is particularly the case with new brands and small businesses. I hope they stick around long enough to make the Lord of the Rings show though, can’t hate on that.
I don’t follow your logic. The Rivian investment is either worth that much less than one quarter ago, or it isn’t.
Continuing in the article:
The Amazon loss came the day after Ford (F), another early investor in Rivian, took a $5.4 billion pre-tax charge related to that investment, resulting in Ford reporting a $3.1 billion net loss for the first quarter.
Just saw one in person driving around yesterday.
Just had one in my warehouse yesterday for a First Mile event (aka test drive). Crawled around it and drove it for an hour long time slot.
Deeply impressive car, even crawling under and looking at all the suspension bits I could see. Excited to get mine in a few months.
Man is the guy obsessed with Tesla, he ends up bringing them up in about every single review. Sure enough…
$700m investment, unless they had subsequent investments is no big deal for Amazon. They want the shareholders and board to focus on Rivian not Amazon for losses so they dangle things in front of them.
