There are a lot of lenses through which to view the failure of the cybertruck: aesthetics, not enough truck not enough SUV, size, association of aesthetics with politics, etc. But I think the main one that is ignored is price.

The cybertruck was built in an era of high truck prices driven by zero interest rates. It bet on the price of trucks going up, just as the Ford F150 electric did. That was the wrong bet.

If it was a $40,000 truck, it would have a much bigger market despite all the other explanations of its failure. The market moved under it.

The average price paid for a full-size truck in the US is north of $65,000.

- https://www.theautopian.com/the-average-full-size-truck-now-...

- https://www.ceicdata.com/en/united-states/new-vehicle-averag...

I think another big one was the time from announcement to release.

When it was announced, for those who wanted an electric truck, it was going to be the only game in town. By the time Tesla delivered, there were several options already on the road from various companies. The people who really wanted an electric truck were already happy customers of another company by the time the cybertruck shipped. I see a fair number of Rivian, F-150 Lightning, and Hummer EVs around me.

When it comes to price, I expect to see a lot of Slate trucks once it starts shipping, with its low price.

True still thru today: Trucks priced higher than the Cybertruck sell at higher volumes than the cybertruck.

Which undermines / invalidates your point.

See: F150 Raptor: 20-25k units per year (estimate), avg price: $100k

The article even said it was a rounding error in terms of Tesla’s earnings, and expectations were tepid to begin with, and other brands such as Ford also failed with electric trucks. It is not as big of a deal as people have made it out to be. The cars are Tesla’s main business by far. The Cybertruck was a distraction basically.

I think the aesthetics are quite important. One thing that set Tesla apart was that they didn’t build weirdmobiles. They started out when manufacturers made “alternative” vehicles look weird to set them apart. The Prius is the classic example. The Leaf was another obvious one. This weirdness has an important impact on the market, because it meant that you called attention to yourself when you were driving one. When you drove a Prius, you weren’t just getting great gas mileage, you were figuratively shouting to everyone around you “look at me, I drive a Prius!” (With an implication of “I’m saving the planet,” and a further implication of “and you’re not, you philisitine.”)

Then Tesla makes an electric car that’s just a car. Surely, they put their own design touches on it, but it mostly looked like an ordinary sedan. Then they made something that mostly looked like an ordinary SUV. And then more ordinary-looking models. They looked distinctive but they didn’t look weird and didn’t make a statement the way a Prius did.

And then they make the weirdest weirdmobile that there ever was. And released it right before making a loud statement of “I’m driving an Elon Musk car!” became really unattractive to a lot of people.

It’s pretty easy to buy a $80k full size ICE truck.

Yes and:

Tesla scaled up CyberTruck production before finding product market fit. Somewhere tween SUV and truck, and without a clear purpose. (I thought Tesla's initial market segment was going to focus on who ever buys Jeeps, boondocking, outdoorsy stuff.)

IMHO, CyberTruck would have been a modest hit if first production run was 100. Treat CyberTruck like Roadster. A niche vehicle for a niche market. Grant enthusiasts the earliest access to the best technology.

I honestly thought that was the plan.

It would have been the cheapest, fastest way for Tesla to de-risk all of the innovations used in CyberTruck. Major stuff that Tesla's could not gracefully, incrementally add to their other models (eg 48V).

And a perfect precursor of for the Robocab (neé Model 2), that would benefit most from the innovations.

Oh well. What do I know? Musk is a trillionaire and I am not, so clearly not much.

It didn't fail, more than Model S did, which saw the same fate.

It certainly did not "fail" on aesthetics. Few people would not take note of it, and it wasn't overly impractical. Some people hated DeLorean too, which just made it even more popular as well ...

I like the aesthetics a lot. It recalls the DeLorean, which is one of my favorite automotive designs.

But the cost is steep when I'm more in the market for an SUV or offroading vehicle than a truck. Not to mention that the extent to which Musk and Tesla are intertwined with politics is really not an easy sell for me.