Lucid Can’t Sell Cars

By Douglas A. McIntyre Published Feb 25, 11:15AM EST

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Lucid Can’t Sell Cars — © hapabapa / iStock Editorial via Getty Images

Shockingly, Lucid shows signs of problems selling its cars. CNBC reported, “Luxury electric vehicle maker Lucid appears to have a demand problem.” As an EV manufacturer expected to have great success, a falling number of people have reservations to buy the cars when they are available. It is harder to imagine a larger catastrophe. (See if Lucid is one of the least reliable cars in America.)

Lucid public filings recently showed reservations for its cars were “over 28,000.” That was down from “over 34,000” in November. Lucid management also plans to build 10,000 to 14,000 this year. Analysts expected double that number.
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CEO Peter Rawlinson made a startling admission. “We’ve solved production. That is not the gating issue here now. My focus is on sales. And here’s the thing: We’ve got what I believe to be the very best product in the world. … Too few people are aware of not just the car, but even the company.” He forgot to mention both the car and the company have gotten massive amounts of media attention. The Lucid Air was named Motor Trend’s “Car of the Year” for 2022. Rawlinson’s comment is a weak excuse.

Lucid’s shares have fallen 63% this year. Based on management’s inability to run the company effectively, they should be down more.

It is worth remembering that a “reservation” for a can is not a sale or even an order. Anyone can reserve a Lucid Air Pure for $300. Lucide has to turn that into an $87,400 sale. To be sure, the reservation figure is used by other car companies but is entirely misleading.
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The demand for EV cars has been sucked out of the market because of Tesla. It has cut prices and may sell as many as two million cars this year. Price cuts will help it maintain market share and elbow out its competitors.

Lucid is on the ropes and has been for some time. The recent news shows how impossible it will be for the company to succeed. (Click here to see the 13 biggest electric vehicle failures in American history.)

About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.