After several years of rapid growth, Tesla US sales appear to have slowed in 2020, in part due to the coronavirus pandemic. This is evident from new data on new vehicle registrations.
In 22 states, which account for around 65 percent of the new car market, 130,844 new Teslas were registered last year, an increase of less than 2 percent compared to 2019, according to the market research company Cross-Sell.
The pandemic dampened sales of all automakers in the spring and summer, forcing companies to suspend most production stops in North America. Tesla’s Fremont, California facility was shut down from late March to mid-May. Last year was also the first full year that Tesla vehicle purchases no longer qualified for a federal tax credit.
The company’s sluggish sales in its 22 states, which include California, Florida, New York, and Texas, came in spite of the addition of the fourth car to Tesla’s lineup, the Model Y, which appears to be selling its top seller, the Model 3.
Model 3 registrations across the state’s 22 cross-sell routes fell 35 percent last year to 67,638 from 103,810 vehicles in 2019. Sales of the Model Y began earlier this year and exceeded those of the Model 3 in August.
“Model Y is doing very well and is really competitive with Model 3,” said Meagan Saxon, director of partnerships at Cross-Sell.
In the last three months of 2020, 22,267 Model Ys were registered in the 22 states. At the same time, Model 3 sales were just 14,823 vehicles, a decrease of almost a third from Q4 2019. Model Y is a more spacious hatchback version of the Model 3 sedan.
Cross-sell provides a rare glimpse into Tesla’s U.S. registrations as the automaker doesn’t breakdown sales by region or country. The company recently reported that its global deliveries rose 36 percent to 499,550 cars in 2020. That increase was mainly due to rapid growth in China, where a new Tesla plant started production of the Model 3 a year ago. Tesla is also growing in Europe, despite increasing competition from new electric cars introduced by Volkswagen, Volvo, and others.
Tesla is expected to announce its fourth quarter financial performance on Wednesday.
Cross-Sell buys vehicle registration data from 22 states that they put for sale. California, where Tesla is based and where many people are much more willing to buy electric cars than other Americans, accounts for about 35 percent of the company’s US sales.
