By aligning himself with what many view as the irresponsible 'open now, no matter what the cost in lives' movement,' Musk may have alienated his core constituency of environmentally and brand conscious upscale consumers. JL
Elon Musk scored a key victory in resuming production at Tesla's Fremont, Calif., plant. But in doing so, he became a polarizing lightning rod at the center of the debate over whether to reopen the economy. His public alignment with the Trump administration and reopen protest movement threatens to alienate high end liberal customers. That's a big gamble for an electric car and clean energy company with a brand closely tied with environmental issues. On social media many people are saying they would now never buy a car from Tesla because Musk's image is so tied to the company's brand.
Elon Musk scored a key victory in resuming production at Tesla's Fremont, Calif., plant.
But in doing so, he became a polarizing lightning rod at the center of the debate over whether to reopen the economy.
His public alignment with the Trump administration and reopen protest movement threatens to alienate high end liberal customers. That’s a big gamble for an electric car and clean energy company with a brand closely tied with environmental issues.
“It further solidifies Musk as a hero and cult icon to some and a villain to others,” said Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives.
Tesla and SpaceX chief executive Elon Musk. (Susan Walsh/AP)
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Recent backlash against the chief executive highlights that his campaign could have long-term consequences for the company’s brand.
It’s not yet clear what impact Musk’s decision to reopen the plant could have on sales — but on social media, many people are saying they would now never buy a car from Tesla. Many critics have voiced their opposition to the Tesla chief executive’s brash tactics to pressure California officials to reopen the factory on Twitter using the hashtag #BoycottTesla.
Musk’s detractors included prominent Democrats, including former Clinton administration labor secretary Robert Reich who called on his more than 880,000 Twitter followers to boycott the car company. Even Joan Grande, the mother of the pop star Ariana Grande, said on Twitter she would have to get rid of her Teslas and called for others to boycott the company.
“How incredibly irresponsible of you,” Joan Grande
tweeted last month in response to a tweet from Musk calling to “Free America Now.” "... and you think you are a person of science and technology ... you're a disgrace.”
Ives said that’s a “risky strategy” for a chief executive to take sides on a divisive political issue when it's that’s trying to sell to all Americans.
Musk has been engaging in increasingly erratic tactics to challenge California's measures to contain the virus — which threatened to impact the company's financial performance. Last month, he called shelter-in-place orders “fascist” during
an expletive-filled rant during the car company’s quarterly earnings call. He escalated his last week when he reopened the Fremont plant in defiance of an Alameda County order, openly daring officials to arrest him. He also threatened to move the factory to another state if California wouldn't allow him to operate.
Musk has been getting a Twitter boost from the Trumps — which could complicate the company's image as a liberal status symbol.
He received
support in his standoff on Twitter from President Trump, who said Tesla should be able to immediately reopen the plant. But it got even weirder this weekend. Musk tweeted to “Take the red pill.” The tweet was an apparent reference to a scene in the film “The Matrix," when the movie's hero is given the option to take a pill to see the truth.
But it's taken on a bigger political meaning in recent years, Nellie Bowles
writes in the New York Times. In online forums, it has been embraced by the right to mean waking up to society's lies. But these “red pill” forums online often contain sexist and racist comments.
“The truth to be woken up to varied, but it ended up usually being about gender,” Nellie writes. “To be red-pilled meant you discovered that feminism was a scam that ruined the lives of boys and girls. In this view, for a male to refuse the red pill was to be weak.”
Ivanka Trump retweeted Musk, saying she had taken it:
And the president's son:
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Musk's apparent alignment with the right could prompt soul-searching for liberals who have seen the car company as a status symbol, Nellie reports
. The comments can feel deeply personal to some car owners because Musk's image is so tied to the company's brand.
“As a Tesla owner, a 47-year-old male recovering from covid-19, and someone very concerned simultaneously about the environment, the economy, my kids’ and my parents’ future, this ain’t great,” Jeff Guilfoyle, a product manager at FireEye in San Diego, told Nellie. “This disease is no joke, and the long-term health impacts are unknown for survivors.”
When the Times asked Musk to explain what he meant by his “red pill” comment, he pasted an image from the website Urban Dictionary in an email.
“‘Red pill’ has become a popular phrase among cyberculture and signifies a free-thinking attitude, and a waking up from a ‘normal’ life of sloth and ignorance," it said. “Red pills prefer the truth, no matter how gritty and painful it may be.”
Musk has always been a contrarian on Twitter – but his recent moves are an escalation.
It's not new for Musk to be at the center of controversy online. He's even
gotten into a dispute with the Securities and Exchange Commission about his use of Twitter.
But the stakes are different this time because employees' safety is on the line. And if any of the returning workers get sick, it could have legal, regulatory and public relations consequences for the company.
“There's a laser focus now on the Tesla factory to make sure there's no health or safety concerns for workers,” Ives said. “This is only the first chapter of how this book is going to be written.”
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