Did Four Canadian Tesla Dealerships Really Sell 8,600 Cars In One Weekend?

In the 72 hours following the federal government’s announcement that Canada’s electric vehicle rebate fund was about to run out – the weekend of January 10th to 12th – four Canadian Tesla dealerships reported record sales. One might even go so far as to describe their sales as unbelievable. Specifically, what we’re talking about is 8,600 cars…in three days, at four stores.

According to Automotive World, this three-day sales figure is higher than Tesla’s total sales in Canada for the entire first quarter of last year:

“Over the course of a single weekend, the EV maker filed a highly unusual 8,653 sales—more than in the entirety of Q1 2024—netting it more than CA$43m (US$29.8m).”

Stephen Rivers, a writer for Carscoops.com and other car publications, ran the numbers and came up with a rough picture of what this hectic Tesla sales weekend could have looked like:

“Four Tesla stores in Canada each sold an average of 30 cars per hour, amounting to 120 cars per hour across all four locations—essentially one car every minute, 24 hours a day…for three straight days. And yes, this includes hours when the stores were closed.”

This sale surge contributed to an incredible amount of electric vehicle rebate claims by Tesla – a boon for the company, but a major financial hit to other dealerships left high and dry:

“While these sales are a win for Elon Musk’s company, they left rival brands without access to the same EV credits. Tesla’s $43.1 million in rebates consumed more than half of the remaining funds for EV subsidies. By the time other dealers attempted to claim their rebates, the money had run out. And there were plenty of them.

According to the Canadian Automobile Dealers Association (CADA), 226 dealerships submitted rebate claims for 2,295 electric vehicles but still haven’t been reimbursed, leaving them collectively out by C$10 million. Additionally, in regions like Quebec, many dealerships are closed on weekends, effectively locking them out of this ‘sales rush’.”

An analysis in the Toronto Star questions the logistics of how one Etobicoke Tesla dealership could have delivered 1,700 cars to customers in a single day – particularly given that their parking lot can apparently only accomodate 200 vehicles:

“While the Tesla dealership in Quebec City topped the list with 2,558 EVs sold that day, the second most sales were made at a Tesla dealership on Dundas Avenue West in Etobicoke, which sold 1,709 eligible vehicles. This dealership sold 2,528 EVs over the final weekend of the iZEV program, more than all the rebates it had previously claimed. 

The government paid out more than $12.5 million to this dealership for that weekend alone.

Employees at the Etobicoke Tesla dealership declined to comment on the sales figures, but did specify that the iZEV rebate is only applied when a customer picks up their vehicle, not when they purchase it online.

There is a large parking lot surrounding the dealership, but it can accommodate fewer than 200 vehicles, according to a count of parking spaces in an aerial view on Google Maps — making it hard to picture how more than 1,700 vehicles could have been delivered to customers on a single day.”

What happened at these four Tesla dealerships on the weekend of January 10-12? A thorough government investigation is in order to determine the legitimacy of Tesla’s recent sales figures and rebate claims.