Before the 2007-2009 recession it seemed like most governments (in the OECD countries) were reluctant to go down the electric vehicle route. Car companies were also reluctant citing high costs of manufacturing, the maximum distance possible for an electric vehicle to cover before requiring recharge, and perceived public rejection as serious hurdles to overcome.
However, what makes me wonder about some of these car companies is that they still market their gas guzzling 2-seater sports cars with bimbos in bikinis standing next to them. The issue of fuel consumption is never raised. They have done such a fantastic marketing job that “sexy” is now synonymous with an expensive sports car. Some of these cars are worse than SUVs when it comes to fuel consumption. If only SUVs were advertised with bimbos in bikinis! I don’t know about you but where I live, most people with SUVs are middle class people running businesses and they need something useful for work. In other cases it is just simple families that are do-it-yourselfers to cut costs, and an SUV is such a convenient workhorse for them.
Now going back to the electric cars and even the petrol-electric hybrids, most of what I have seen so far for the general public is so unattractive that even grandma wouldn’t want to drive one. None of those cars are advertised with bimbos in bikinis either. You are left wondering whether it’s a deliberate move from cars companies to ensure that the public will not like electric cars. They are also very expensive, which is off-putting.
I also found out recently from The Economist magazine that a study at Concordia University in Montreal showed that testosterone levels shot up when men got behind the wheel of a sexy sports car, and fell, making them lose their joie de vivre, when they were made to drive a clunky family saloon car. I bet the results would have not changed if the latter car was one of those electric or petrol-electric hybrid vehicles we have on the market today.
The recession must have forced most governments to look at how to use stimulus money to prop up ailing economies and going green seems to have been embraced by many as a way out. Subsidies for purchasing electric cars have got many companies (that have been sitting on the fence), now looking at the possibilities of going electric for some of their vehicles. Has anyone noticed the number of electric vehicles at the Paris Motor Show 2010?
Fast Tube by Casper
Those subsidies will not last for long and I wonder if they dry up whether it will be business-as-usual again for these car companies, i.e. back to petrol cars.
I am not convinced yet that car companies are sold out to the “electric-vehicle” idea. CHANGE has not happened until you start to see “sexy” and practical designs, with bimbos in bikinis standing next to such vehicles. Get me an EV that will even excite the people of Gisburn, restore their joie de vivre, and I will know we are certainly on the road to reducing carbon emissions and curbing climate change. If you do not know about Gisburn and Renault cars you ought to check this out:
Fast Tube by Casper
