TOGETHER WITH:
Howdy, Fam!
Happy Labor Day!
Before you head out, a quick fact worth knowing:
The two-day weekend most people enjoy today has real automotive roots.
In 1914, Henry Ford doubled factory wages to $5 a day and cut hours to eight, a move the industry called insane at the time.
By 1926, Ford went further, moving to a five-day, 40-hour week for factory workers, one of the first major companies in America to do it.
Ford's own reasoning was simple: workers needed time to actually enjoy what they were building, and maybe even buy one themselves.
So today, as much as it's a day off, it's also a small nod to an industry that partnered with workers to achieve so much, and even carve out the very idea of the weekend.
See you back here tomorrow with the full rundown.
Keep Pushing Back,
—Chris with Paul, Kyle & Kristi
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Tesla's Cybercab Launch Drew a Federal Investigation Before the Confetti Settled
Tesla finally launched the Cybercab.
NHTSA opened a formal probe into it roughly 24 hours later. That's not the sequence Tesla was hoping for.
Timeline of a Rough 48 Hours
When | What Happened |
|---|---|
Sept 3, evening | Cybercab event held in downtown Austin, invite-only, no public livestream, Musk didn't appear |
Sept 4, morning | Tesla shares jump 5.4% ahead of the reveal |
Sept 4, same day | NHTSA opens an "audit query" into whether Cybercab's self-certification meets federal safety standards |
Sept 4, afternoon | Tesla opens Cybercab rides to the public in a geofenced Austin zone, seemingly in response |
Sept 4, close | Tesla shares drop 6%, erasing the prior day's gain and then some |
The Vehicle at the Center of It
The Cybercab is a two-seat, gold-colored robotaxi with butterfly doors and, notably, no steering wheel, no pedals, and no mirrors. It runs entirely on Tesla's Full Self-Driving software with zero manual override if anything goes wrong. Roughly 45 vehicles are authorized to operate in Austin today.
I don't think there is a reasonable interpretation that can be made to suggest that the Cybercab can comply with the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards.
Why This Is a Genuinely Interesting Regulatory Fight
Unlike most countries, U.S. automakers can self-certify that a new vehicle meets federal safety standards, no pre-approval required. That's the loophole Tesla appears to be leaning on. NHTSA offers a formal exemption path for vehicles without manual controls, but it caps deployment at 2,500 vehicles per automaker per year. Tesla's engineering chief has said Cybercab won't be subject to that cap, though NHTSA says Tesla never applied for the exemption in the first place.
Tesla has historically tested limits and pushed boundaries on regulations. I fully expect Tesla to test the limits.
Amazon's Zoox already ran this exact play, self-certifying a similarly control-free vehicle, and it didn't go well. NHTSA investigated, Zoox withdrew its certification claim, and it took roughly another year before the company secured a legitimate federal exemption.
Wall Street Wasn't Impressed Either
Analysts at both RBC Capital Markets and Wells Fargo panned the event itself, independent of the regulatory news. RBC noted "limited new incremental disclosure" on pricing, production timelines, and regulatory approval, while Wells Fargo's note carried the blunt headline "TSLA Cybercab Launch Event Underwhelms." Early riders have also reported routing errors and long wait times on the existing Austin robotaxi service.
A federal audit and a 6% stock drop within 24 hours of launch is not the debut Tesla scripted.
Whether Tesla's self-certification survives NHTSA's audit query is now a real open question, one three former senior NHTSA officials told Reuters could genuinely end up in court. Tesla has bet its stock valuation, sitting north of $1.4 trillion, on autonomy and robotics succeeding at scale. This week's launch was supposed to be proof of that bet paying off. Instead, it opened with a regulatory question mark nobody at Tesla seems eager to answer yet.
Meet Your New Long-Term Customer
A customer who buys once is valuable. A customer who returns for service and their next vehicle can be worth much more.
CarRx helps dealerships create F&I value today while giving customers useful ownership support that keeps the dealership part of the relationship after delivery.
What Dealers Actually Risk by Partnering with a Chinese Automaker
Great product. Attractive price. That's the pitch dealers worldwide are hearing from Chinese automakers right now, and Michael Dunne says it's not wrong. It's just incomplete.
Dunne has spent years watching China's domestic auto market up close, and he's seeing dealers in markets like Kazakhstan and Russia already courting BYD, Geely, Leapmotor, and Xpeng. His warning isn't about the product. It's about what happens after the honeymoon.
There's a saying in China: when Chinese enter an industry, profits are the first to hit the exits.
Inside China's own domestic market, Dunne says that's already played out. Dealers, suppliers, and manufacturers alike are struggling to turn a profit. Chinese automakers have shown a willingness to sustain little or no margin for extended periods, a strategy that works when the goal is market share, not necessarily when the goal is a dealer's long-term enterprise value.
If my enterprise value today is a billion dollars, will it be half a billion five years from now? That's the risk. When you engage with the Chinese, understand what kind of tango you're getting into. Terrific product, but what happens to margins?
That's not a rhetorical question. It's the actual due diligence Dunne is recommending: not "is this a good car at a good price," but "what does this partnership do to my business if the same margin compression that happened inside China happens here too."
A great product at a great price is only half the deal. The other half is what it costs you five years from now.
Dealers already in these conversations aren't wrong to be excited about the product. Dunne's point is narrower and sharper than "be cautious": know exactly what pattern you're stepping into before you step into it, because the pattern already has a track record, and it isn't a profitable one for the dealers who got there first.
Join us on September 9th at 2pm for an exclusive 30-minute session with Cuyler Owens, CEO at Widewail, as he dives into findings from a Widewail study matching six months of customer reviews at 350+ franchise dealerships against the repair-order revenue behind them: some staff behaviors show up clearly in dollars per RO, and being friendly isn't one of them.
He'll also show attendees how to run their own competitive comparison—which competitors actually matter, and how to measure their store's experience against them using review data on every franchise dealership in the country.
🚘 Car Stuff
The pump is putting a bit of a damper on Labor Day travel with gas prices reaching their highest holiday-weekend level on record. ⛽️
Within hours of Tesla deploying its Cybercab in Austin, TX on Friday, federal regulators opened an investigation into whether the vehicle meets safety standards. 🕵️♀️
Groovy, baby! The vintage red-white-and-blue Corvette from Austin Powers is going up for auction in October. 🇺🇸
1813: The Troy Post published one of the earliest printed references to "Uncle Sam." The nickname stemmed from soldiers joking that the "U.S." stamp on beef barrels stood for Samuel "Uncle Sam" Wilson, a local meat packer from Troy, New York. 🥩
1896: A. H. Whiting wins the first automobile race held on a closed-circuit track in Cranston, RI. 🏁
1916: The Workers' Compensation Act is passed by U.S. Congress. 🛠️
Thanks for reading, Friend!
