Full Stop, How Many EV Chargers Does It Take?, EV Updates, Guest Host Todd Caputo

‍SPEAKERS

Paul Daly, Todd Caputo

Paul Daly  00:23

All right. It's Wednesday we have Todd Caputo on the show again, air traffic is stopped. We're gonna figure out how many Evie chargers we need in the year 2030. And whatever else happens to come up in the next 12 to 15 minutes, you're gonna get that people really isn't who I need, they stopped this day when they see me. So it's been a wild Wednesday already. Kyle is in on the ground in Phoenix because we were at an NCM 20 group with David Kane yesterday, the day before he was flying out this morning. I flew home yesterday. And he texted me saying every flight across the US is stopped fully. And, you know, the first thing that comes to mind is like, Is there a problem? Like not not like a computer problem, like a real problem. And, you know, the US was pretty quick to say it's not a cyber attack. But the their system called no tan, which alerts pilots and crew to safety advisories went down, like one piece of software went down for the FAA. And they stopped everything. And that represents over 21,000 flights scheduled today. 2.9 million people moving around the country. And then we just got word before we hit like live stream that they're starting to resume some flight. So your your wife is not home right now.

Todd Caputo  01:34

Right? So yeah, I was up in New York with my wife. I got home last night late. I'm glad I got here. I'm glad I got back to North Carolina. So she's supposed to fly home tonight. We'll see what happens. But yeah,

Paul Daly  01:43

no doubt. What

Todd Caputo  01:45

do you think insurance companies, insurance stuff like this for airlines when stuff like that happens? I

Paul Daly  01:50

mean, like if you buy the flight insurance?

Todd Caputo  01:53

Well, no. I mean, I'm talking with consumers. I'm talking about for the airlines themselves. I wonder if they have insurance for stuff like that. Curious?

Paul Daly  01:59

I think that'd be because it's a really random

Todd Caputo  02:01

odd thing where every flight in the country is canceled? Yeah,

Paul Daly  02:05

yeah. I mean, the past pretty low, very, I don't know, let's say, like an insurance salesman, or like an actuary was thinking, yeah, maybe we can sell some I don't think anyone's lining up to insure that

Todd Caputo  02:19

business interruption insurance really is what it is. Right. I just wonder if that would be something that would be covered?

Paul Daly  02:23

I don't know. Wow, that's a great question. But it's good to know, that we know in the auto industry, so many people travel all the time, everywhere all the time. So there are likely 1000s of our brothers and sisters in the auto industry held up at airports right now. We're going to be held up today. But you know what? That's just a little blip. We can handle that.

Todd Caputo  02:41

I wonder if it's private checks, too. I'm gonna guess. Yes.

Paul Daly  02:44

I would think so. Yeah, probably. I would think so. Yeah. I mean, like, if if the warning system is down, and I'm in a private jet, I'm still probably like, yeah, maybe we could just hang out here for

Todd Caputo  02:53

all your so do private jet that says a photo down the side.

Paul Daly  02:57

That'll be the day. That'll be the day one, day one, day one, we'll do that we need to move our people around. We need to move our people around. Um, a couple other things going on. Obviously, we are teeing up very quickly heading towards nada show, which is going to be full of just a lot of handshakes and hugs and new technologies and lots of stuff. To learn. The opening party is going to have Armadillo racing. I've never been a part of that. But the asoto team is going to be there in full effect. Todd, you're gonna be there.

Todd Caputo  03:24

I'm gonna be there. I can't wait. I don't. I never missed it ever. I'm missing 20 How

Paul Daly  03:28

many? How many? Do you think you've gone to 25?

Todd Caputo  03:31

Let's I don't miss it. I just don't. Yeah, it was crazy.

Paul Daly  03:35

It always it always amazes me how you randomly run into people in a show so big. But you and I have randomly run into each other nada.

Todd Caputo  03:42

Remember, you can always judge how good businesses based on how many ice sculptures and parties are are at nada. Is that is that the count? That is? So I remember like, oh nine right after the crash. Nada. And those dealers that were there will remember. Like there was nothing. Under images. Yeah, it was it was. Yeah, it was it was PBJ and bologna and stuff like that. And like that was about it. So within business got better. The parties get better the ice sculptures come back. But yeah, this this will be good. Dallas will be interesting. First time. I don't remember being in Dallas before ever? No, I don't think so. Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. It's gonna be great. It's gonna be really good to see some people in the industry and good to see you and your team. No,

Paul Daly  04:21

I can't wait. Yeah, likewise. And we're gonna we're bringing a full team, we're gonna bring in like 15 people full production, you will see the pirate ship that is asoto. Just kind of like stampeding its way around nada. There's also a lot of ancillary events, we're going to be a part of events prior to the show open, you know, so we're going to post the list of everywhere will be I'm going to be teaching a workshop on Saturday. And yeah, so we're going to be everywhere and anywhere.

Todd Caputo  04:45

I'm coming to your workshop and what do you got to teach me I'm coming. Well,

Paul Daly  04:49

how to build a recession proof marketing strategy. Perfect. Good. Yeah. And the thing is, like I had to come up with that, like nine months ago, because of that a DA you know, tip Kyle and I are building presentations, like as we're heading in to the place that we're speaking, because like we try to be as relevant as possible. You know, but but this one nada, you have to have your stuff in like nine months. Yeah. All buttoned up. So so it was like, if we'll take we'll take a gamble. And the worst case scenario, a lot of the principles are very similar to just building a good marketing strategy. And so we'll do that. We have a fun question to answer today on the show. And I was really just looking for an excuse to use our little trigger pad from here and extravaganza. So we're going to talk about how many Evie chargers will it take to keep things rolling in the year 2030 20. A little preparation track here. Good luck with that. Okay, okay. The new question that a report from s&p Global Mobility is trying to answer is how many Evie chargers will it take to keep things rolling in 2030. At the rate of evey adoption, there are currently about 160,000 chargers, you know, about 17,000, Tesla's superchargers 126 plus 1000 of level two chargers and about 10,000 Level Three chargers, these are public chargers that are around for anybody's use, there's about 1.9 million EVs on the road. And while sold in 2022, are now on the road. Currently, sales accounted for 45.4% of all sales in 2022. So we see the rate of adoption increasing, there's an estimated rate of adoption of 40%. This report says in 2030, and says that US will need to quadruple the number of chargers by 2025. So here's here's the progression. We have about 160,000 chargers on the ground now, by the year 2025, we need to quadruple the amount of chargers, and then 8x, the amount of chargers by 2030, leading to 1.2 million level two chargers, and 109,000 level three chargers, by 20. Just by 2027. The whole thing is like ramping up on this curve. So in the end all said and done the answer to the question, s&p thinks we need to point 1 million level two chargers and 172,000 level three chargers? So that's a question you own an Eevee. Right? I personally have a really hard time thinking of any practicality of a level, like a level two charger when you're traveling unless it's like somewhere where you can stay for quite a while. But what's your take on this?

Todd Caputo  07:29

So what about the grid? That's the first thing that comes to my head. We can't like, what, three, four weeks? To the Chargers? Yeah, so it was really cold a few weeks ago, there was rolling blackouts, like across the country because it got so cold. Everybody was using their heat, the electric heat pumps, like there was rolling blackouts here where I live in Charlotte, they had some What about the grid, you can have all the charges in the world, but I'm not. I'm not the smartest guy in the world. But the first thing I think about is what's going on. You got power, all these things, you have power all these chargers. And then the other thing I would think about too from investment standpoint is okay, who's going to who's going to build these charges? Who's going to make them who's gonna make the components? Because this year if you're gonna bet on the stock market and being investor, you want to figure out who's who's on the know who's going to be in who's going to get contracts, a lot of marketing, they're going to be government deals with state, local, federal, I don't know again, love EVs. Don't get me wrong, I still think it's, I don't know, I don't want to call it a pipe dream, because I don't think it's a pipe dream. But I think it's gonna take a lot longer than Ms. 2023. Seven years is gonna go by that fast and I don't think it's going to truly happen. I mean, it's every one of these things. And well,

Paul Daly  08:37

I mean, tell me about Tell me about your charging experience because in the article we linked up in the show notes from electric you know, they were one of the writers was talking about the level two Evie chargers and how they're largely in useless areas. Like he mentioned like at the Logan Airport, there's level two Evie chargers, except you can't leave your car plugged in while you travel. If they won't let you do that. He's like so what are you going to do with a level two charger at an airport? Nothing

Todd Caputo  09:01

can look I've got a Tesla right and I drive it I drove to Florida was it 11 hours each way to see your grandmother before Christmas and you know, no problems, right? But I'm an I was in South, it's warm. You get that up in New York, where you and I are from on a cold day. You got a problem and I don't unless they really change and improve the technology. There's going to be certain parts of the country where it just it's not going to make any sense to Oman and not going to make any sense to build out the infrastructure because of the cold and just

Paul Daly  09:33

cold I almost put this article in here it's funny you mentioned that because there's there's like some new new procedures and tech coming out where they're using heat pumps to heat the vehicle because that's what drains the battery is keeping the vehicle the interior warm, right because there's no there's no fluid there's nothing to like pull heat from so it just literally is a battery discharging to create hot air, which is a very inefficient process. And so they think maybe heat pumps or something like that. Um, you know, so there's a Joe Rogan interview where Peters Elon, I'm going to find the clip and we'll post it. But you know, he thinks that EVs aren't going to be sustainable in any way. And we have a broad variety of thinking across the spectrum. Joe pistyll, look him up on LinkedIn, a friend of yours and mine had had a lightning bolt post yesterday that talks about Toyota and how their hybrid approach is so much more sustainable and ready, and everybody bought in that Elon Musk stream. And now the companies that did are going to find themselves behind because the hybrid approach is so much more sustainable.

Todd Caputo  10:36

They should be. They should be hybrids, hybrids, just it's common sense to me, that it should be hybrids, and the people that are running Toyota know what to and look at, I wouldn't bet against Toyota ever.

Paul Daly  10:48

I know I got

Todd Caputo  10:52

3040 years ago, were sorely mistaken. Just people often think of Toyota franchises for nothing. They've done extremely, extremely well, you get your hands on a Toyota franchise, it's like gold. So it's got to be hybrid. So it makes a lot more sense to me. I when I was in Syracuse, I got a flat tire the other day, first time in a very long time, and I had to go through the experience of roadside assistance. And again, I was driving a Toyota four runner right? TRD PRO, flat tire completely, like down to zero. And the roadside experience was terrible. But I thought to myself, well, what if? What if whatever is driving EVs? What's going to happen if for some reason you die on the side of the road? How long is it going to take to charge up your car to get you to a charging station? And what kind of equipment are mobile service companies or mobile service car dealers going to have to have in order to just give people enough juice to get to where they're going? If they're Evie dies.

Paul Daly  11:47

But you think about that, too. I mean, that that raises a whole other question. If heating your vehicle discharges it quickly, and you get a flat tire in the winter in a cold climate and your battery dies, like you know, even if you have a quarter tank of fuel, like your car is gonna run for a really long time if it's just that idle, right? Because you're just sipping the gas EVs are not going to be the same story. So it's just you know, it's interesting going through a winter where there's been a large number of Evie amount of Evie involvement and adoption and we're just starting to address these issues. Yeah, it's just going to be a common discussion that discussion around the community not only internally in auto but but broadly in retail. And we'll see we'll see where

Todd Caputo  12:28

it goes. I read an article that they were considered considering banning natural gas stoves but

Paul Daly  12:34

I didn't read I didn't read an article I just got pinged with it like six times from six different sources yesterday like Wall Street Journal, and they're like, hey, and I don't know what that's all about. I haven't

Todd Caputo  12:45

my wife told me and again, I don't cook I can't cook a thing I can cook on the grill but that's about as far as it goes. She said she said that when you cook on an oven with its natural gas or propane cook a lot better on an oven without a doubt. electric range makes sense to

Paul Daly  12:59

me. I know but I know enough about cooking is trying to control temperature with electric is very, very difficult. I mean, it just

Todd Caputo  13:05

needs to be there needs to be I guess common sense. I think a more common sense approach is good I am

Paul Daly  13:11

although they said they said it was for safety reasons is is just in the the notice that I saw but I don't know I think that the world has been doing okay with gas safety for like 100 More than 100 years right? People have been cooking inside with gas and propane and fire and all that stuff. We can have flames inside we've shown we can handle

Todd Caputo  13:32

it when they're gonna mandate. I think I read about this in New York. I was read syracuse.com They're gonna mandate that any new homes in New York that are built have to have a heat pump. And they can't ever traditional furnace jewelry. They're no Yeah, Google that.

Paul Daly  13:45

Sounds about right. Well, look, it's the fun part of living in New York really keeps you on your toes second only to California. David Long A good friend of ours says California is not for the faint of heart living here. I wouldn't recommend it. He goes but here we go. It's like one of those things. Todd Todd grew up in Syracuse had a second generation dealer if you didn't know and, you know, built built a large used car operation has Chevy store was acquired by Sonic automotive a few years ago. So and now he lives in North Carolina. And still obviously, once a dealer always the dealer gets to work with dealers all across the country

Todd Caputo  14:15

to see my old Chevy hat.

Paul Daly  14:17

I know. It's the original one. That's the

Todd Caputo  14:21

Chevy bowtie on my blog.

Paul Daly  14:22

So I just want to hit other a couple other quick news updates on EVs. You've probably seen this we're not gonna go too much into this. I also thought I want to see what what's on your mind. While we have a few minutes left. You know, reviens having some shifts and issues. According to The Wall Street Journal article, several top executives, really long tenure ones have recently left Randy Frank, VP, overseeing other body engineering as well as Steve Garbowsky. He was the head of the supply chain. They're both there for a long time. Just late last year, Patrick Hunt, a senior strategy director left so obviously a lot of shake up going there. Also, Tesla announced yesterday they're building a $775 million expansion on the 5.5 billion dollar factory that they just made an Austin a lot of things moving and shaking. I don't want to really hang on EVs too much longer because there's a whole other industry out of there. Speaking of the whole other industry segway, just had to use the Segway, but at least once. Todd, you get to be in dealers all across the country, you pay attention in the news, you pay attention to the used car markets. What is at the top of mine, what seems to be coming up in conversations more than more than others? What's the

Todd Caputo  15:27

water, there's a lot of water right now. And inventory, especially stuff that's over 30 days, I mean, the used car market, I read an article the other day to market depreciated last year, like 15%, or was 14.7%. You know, Cox did a an hour long broadcast the other day about basically summarize 2022 I think there's water and dealers are concerned about the water more than anything else. And there's inventory that just has to go. And I think that the next six months, we still need to hit bottom and use current market, it'll happen. But if you don't have really, really, really good processes, and you're not turning inventory every 20 to 25 days, and you don't want to lean, they're gonna have a problem. I do straight up but they go well, cardio for sure know how to figure out things and we'll get through it. We always have, we always will. But that's I think that's top of mind more than anything else is they're looking at the auto or Vin queue or whatever they use. And they're looking at their cost to market and they're looking at the price to market and they've got inventory and buckets now that are going to go 30 or 45 days or 60 days out inventory that they own for 100 200 305% cost to market. Its problem.

16:37

Yeah, you know, Brian Kramer, who many of you know and if you don't follow him, you should follow him on LinkedIn because he releases a lot of great articles longtime dealer. He's with Accu trade now. And basically he said you know the use car appraisal process and how you buy cars is no longer like a straight line curve decision. He says more like an algorithm when when you're pricing cars and acquiring cars like he's it's just more complicated than it used to be just more complicated. And

Todd Caputo  17:05

it's more risky. It's more risky right now, it wasn't really risky last year when cars were going up. Now, if you wanted in a car and you could either sell it to a retail customer or sell it on car off or take it to the auction make money with it. But now it's the opposite. So I think I think a lot of dealers are just, they're nervous, especially with more expensive cars about really what to put in them because nobody knows what the bottom is. Where the bottom is. It's not a good place to be. But again, you still got to make deals. You got to recondition cars really fast. You got to merchandising properly, you got to turn them really, really fast.

Paul Daly  17:35

They go so much complexity, but like you said, deals are figured out because they always figured out the question will be who figures it out first, because they're the ones that are going to disproportionately win. Let's go get Wednesday. Todd, thanks for joining us again. Probably flying. See you soon.

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