Model 3 Made Tesla The Largest Selling Sedan in Its Segment and a Real Car Company

It may not have been a smooth ride but Tesla reached the finish line, producing its 5,000th Model 3 in a week. CEO, Elon Musk championed the milestone in a company-wide email, joking that Tesla "just became a real car company." The car finished final quality checks at around 5am PST Sunday morning—mere hours after the second quarter deadline. In addition to hitting that milestone, Tesla also met its production goals of manufacturing 7,000 cars per week. This includes 5,000 Model 3s, and 2000 Model Xs and Model S vehicles combined. It's unclear if the company can keep up its pace in the long term, though much has changed since the first Model 3 was produced.

Model 3 and The $2,500 Explained

One example is how Tesla recently nixed 300 "unnecessary" spot welds holding the underbody together and reprogrammed its welding robots. Tesla added more humans to the new production line.

Many media outlets, including Torque News, claimed that Tesla last week asked all holders of a $1000 Model 3 reservation for an additional $2,500 to confirm their order.

To correct earlier reports, what was sent out last Thursday night was an invitation for all North American Tesla Model 3 reservation holders to configure their car on the Tesla.com website. Once designed, the refundable reservation becomes a confirmed order for a designed car, after selection paint and other options, and a $2,500. Payment is required to confirm and order your design. After 3 days from that order being placed, the total of $3,500 is applied to your Model 3 purchase price and becomes non-refundable.

Your Tesla Model 3 Now in 2-3 Months

Reservation holders may configure a new car for delivery in 2-3 months from now if they are considering the Long Range premium interior version of the Model 3, which has a range of 310 miles and starts at $49,000.00 The much-awaited Standard Range 215 mile $35,000.00 model 3 is promised to be available in early 2019. If a reservation holder is waiting for the $35,000.00 model 3 they can leave their reservation alone and wait to configure it when that model is ready to order.

Pricing for the dual motor all wheel drive Model 3 has been dropped to a $53.000.00 starting point. A model 3 with every possible option, including Full Self Driving and Performance inverter can cost $80,000.00

After the unprecedented move of constructing a two football field-long “Sprung Tent” on the north side to house a new second assembly line for the Model 3 and starting production in it, the Tesla general assembly team celebrated with a photo and signed a big “Tesla Model 3 5000 Club” poster in a photo op.

Tesla's Second Quarter Production Numbers

Tesla announced its Q2 production figures today of 53,339 vehicles produced and 40,740 delivered. Of those the majority were model 3, with 18,440 delivered, 5031 produced last week, meaning that Tesla, using the new General Assembly line under the sprung tent in Fremont was able to meet it’s weekly production goals of 5000 a week for the quarter.

This marks the transition of Tesla into a true mass-market automaker. With over 420,000 Model 3 reservation holders waiting for a car, this makes the Tesla Model 3 by far the largest selling sedan in its segment, which includes BMW 3 series, Audi A4, Mercedes C class, and Lexus IS.

Image source: Twitter.

Just saw my first Tesla Model 3 up close and in-person. Having spent 15 years off and on in the automotive quality space, this is...not good. pic.twitter.com/DKWJ0JXvNG— Brian Gluckman (@bgluckman) February 19, 2018