Chris Collins discusses why it's so hard for new EV startups to break into the US market. Around 120 companies are trying. Vinfast, a Vietnamese automaker, is attempting entry with minimal brand recognition and mostly virtual service, while established companies like Toyota took decades to build trust.
Roughly 120.
About 35,000 cars.
California (with showrooms in Los Angeles).
Do you know how many electric vehicle car companies are coming into the market?
I have a guess of roughly 120.
120.
What do you think?
Yeah, it's a lot.
Yeah.
We're going back to the beginning of the automotive industry when there were thousands of car companies and they were more local, right?
Yes. When anyone with a last name had a car company.
Yeah, basically.
So this Vinfast is coming into the marketplace.
With some distinct disadvantages.
In the sense that nobody in the US Or Canada, when they think an amazing automobile, does the country of origin in their mind pop up is Vietnam.
Yeah, that's true. Right. It's not in your top 50.
Yeah. And so they're a car company from Vietnam. So that's a disadvantage a little bit, because you just don't have. You don't have a script for that, mentally. Like, we understand cars from Korea, we understand cars from Japan, we understand cars from France. The Renault. Yeah, the Renault. We understand cars from Italy, definitely. We understand guns isn't the beret. I mean, in Italy it is. So you got. You got Ferrari, you know, so we kind of have these connections, right?
Yeah.
And even we understand to some degree that there's cars coming from China that are electric.
That might have another name on them, too.
Yeah, but we understand China, but nobody thinks Vietnam like, it doesn't. So that's a distinct disadvantage that in the marketplace, to get somebody to spend 40 or 60 or $100,000 on a. On a car that has. The company has no infrastructure. So there's no service departments, there's no history, there's no brand recognition.
That seems like a risky bet to buy that car.
Oh, yeah. Well, I mean, just thinking, even the Korean thing, think 25 years ago how hard it was for Hyundai, Kia and Daewoo to get into the market.
Oh, go. Go beyond that and think about how hard it was for Honda and Toyota.
Oh, yeah, for sure. It was. It was decades. Right. For them to really kind of get their footprint.
Oh, yeah. And in the beginning, I don't. I don't know if you remember this, but their quality wasn't that great.
I don't. I think it was a little bit before my time.
Yeah. Their quality wasn't. They figured quality out, but it wasn't. In the beginning, it wasn't that great. And also they. The cars were underpowered, so.
Yeah, they. Were there a lawnmower engines?
Yeah, that would be the joke, right? They were. They were lawnmower engines. And so they're coming into the marketplace selling some cars in Vietnam. So they, I think they sell 35,000. 35,000 cars in Vietnam. They are only coming into California.
Now.
What I think is some of these companies that are coming into the US or that are starting are going to gravitate towards LA or New York, because let's face it, if you take New York City, Manhattan, and you take Los Angeles and put them together, you got Canada.
Oh, by population, there's more people in those two cities than all of Canada. Right.
Good lord. That's crazy to think about that, isn't it?
But if you're going to start a company without a lot of infrastructure and you just need population.
Yeah. 1% market pen in L. A and New York is better than 1% in Canada. Yeah, I get that.
So they're going to start here in Los Angeles. They're going to have showroom there. They're also kind of just following the Tesla roadmap, where they're going to be in malls. Yeah, they are going. So their service is going to be a hundred percent virtual in the sense that they will come to you. Which Tesla started out that way.
Yep. That's how Hoagie did his thing.
Yeah. So one of our coaches on our team was OG to Tesla and he had a whole region. He was the only technician in a whole region in the Midwest. And if something happened, he would fly in and have to, like, figure it out. Go to Home Depot. Thanks so much for watching this clip of Service driving Revolution. We're uploading new stuff every day, so make sure you subscribe and click the bell icon so you don't miss out. If you have a question you'd like us to answer on the show, call 8333 Ask SDR and we'll answer your question on the show. That's 8333 AskSDR. For special deals on our books and training, head over to to offers.chriscollinsinc.com now that's offers.chriscollinsInc.com I'm Chris Collins and I'll see you in the next video.
