Ask nearly anyone, they usually’ll let you know that new vehicles are too costly. Within the wake of tariffs shaking the auto trade and with the Trump administration pledging to kill the federal EV incentive, that scenario isn’t seeking to get higher quickly, particularly for anybody wanting one thing battery-powered. Altering that overly spendy establishment goes to take one thing radical, and it’s exhausting to get extra radical than what Slate Auto has deliberate.
Meet the Slate Truck, a sub-$20,000 (after federal incentives) electrical car that enters manufacturing subsequent 12 months. It solely seats two but has a mattress large enough to carry a sheet of plywood. It solely does 150 miles on a cost, solely is available in grey, and the one technique to take heed to music whereas driving is when you convey alongside your cellphone and a Bluetooth speaker. It’s the naked minimal of what a contemporary automobile might be, and but it’s taken three years of growth to get thus far.
However that is greater than bargain-basement motoring. Slate is presenting its truck as minimalist design with DIY objective, an try to not simply go low-cost however to create a brand new class of auto with an enormous deal with personalization. That design additionally allows a low-cost method to manufacturing that has caught the attention of main traders, reportedly together with Jeff Bezos. It’s been engineered and can be manufactured in America, however is that this excessive simplification an excessive amount of for American customers?
Simplify, Then Embrace Injury
When you haven’t seen the leaks and the studies of weirdly wrapped vans hiding in plain sight, the Slate Truck is the primary product from Michigan-based Slate Auto. Assume “American kei truck” and also you’re not far off. It’s a machine designed to be extraordinarily primary, extraordinarily customizable, and very reasonably priced. These are usually not your typical design objectives, however then the Slate Truck isn’t the fruit of your typical design course of.
Wander by any automotive design studio anyplace on this planet and also you’ll inevitably come throughout a temper board or two, sweeping collages of placing pictures meant to align the inventive flows of passers-by. They’re a instrument for serving to a disparate design group to create a cohesive product, however the place many such temper boards function glamour pictures of unique roads and delightful individuals, entrance and heart within the Slate’s temper board was one thing totally different: a giant, grey shark, coated in scrapes and scars.
“It appears like a shark that has undoubtedly been in a couple of brawl and clearly has come out forward as a result of it’s nonetheless swimming,” says Tisha Johnson, head of design at Slate and who previously spent a decade at Volvo. That aesthetic, of highlighting quite than hiding battle scars, is vital to the Slate ethos.
As a substitute of metal or aluminum, the Slate Truck’s physique panels are molded of plastic. Or, as Slate calls them, “injection molded polypropylene composite materials.” The speculation is that this makes them extra sturdy and scratch-resistant, if solely as a result of the shortage of paint means they’re one coloration during. Auto fans of a sure age will keep in mind the identical method utilized by the now-defunct Saturn Company, a producing method that by no means caught on throughout the trade.
Slate continues the theme by to the upholstery, too, a heathered textile that was designed to get higher wanting because it wears. The thought is to lean into the aged aesthetic.
However not everyone will dig the shark theme, and so the Slate Truck is designed to be customizable to a level by no means seen earlier than on a manufacturing car. Johnson says that is in distinction to the overly curated expertise provided by many manufacturers.
She says over-curation by automotive designers leads to conditions like premium, luxurious vehicles which can be solely accessible in a palette of disappointingly bland colours: “There’s normally solely a fraction that you simply really need, and people are at all times costlier,” she says.
Disparaging different manufacturers for providing restricted coloration decisions might sound disingenuous coming from the designer of a car accessible in a single shade. The Slate Truck, although, was designed to reap the benefits of the present development of vinyl-wrapping vehicles. Its easy form and minimal trim items imply that even amateurs can do the job. Slate will provide DIY kits that newbies can slap on in a day and change simply as shortly based mostly on temper.
Nevertheless, the largest advantage of this monochromatic considering may are available manufacturing.
Naked-Minimal Manufacturing
It’s in all probability no shock to you that constructing vehicles is pricey. Elon Musk likes to bemoan simply how sophisticated the method might be at any time when Tesla is late transport its subsequent new mannequin, however he’s removed from alone in that evaluation.
What’s rather less generally identified is simply how costly it’s to color these vehicles. Making a facility that may reliably, shortly, and cleanly lay down a high quality coat of coloration on automotive physique elements is an advanced job.
That job has solely gotten extra sophisticated (and thus costly) in recent times, with better environmental laws and shopper expectations forcing producers to search out methods to supply extra vibrant hues with much less ecological influence. Mercedes-Benz simply introduced it’s constructing a “Subsequent Technology Paintshop” at its Sindelfingen plant in Germany, and estimates place the factor’s value at practically $1 billion.
By eliminating paint, and thus eliminating the paint store, Slate’s manufacturing course of is massively simplified. So, too, the shortage of steel physique elements. “Now we have no paint store, we have now no stamping,” says Jeremy Snyder, Slate’s chief business officer who previously led Tesla’s international enterprise efforts.
Car factories are inclined to have excessive ceilings to make room for the multiple-story stamping machines that kind steel physique elements. Injection molding of plastic is much simpler and cheaper to do in restricted areas — areas just like the manufacturing facility that Slate has bought for its manufacturing, reportedly close to Indiana. “The car is designed, engineered, and manufactured within the US, with nearly all of our provide chain based mostly within the US,” Snyder says.
The simplification goes easier nonetheless. Slate will make only one car, in only one trim, in only one coloration, with every part from larger battery packs to SUV improve kits added on later.
“As a result of we solely produce one car within the manufacturing facility with zero choices, we’ve moved all the complexity out of the manufacturing facility,” Snyder says.
Whereas most patrons will rightly fixate on the price of the truck, the larger story right here may simply be this radically simplified method to manufacturing. “From the very starting, our enterprise mannequin has been such that we attain money circulation positivity very shortly after begin of manufacturing. And so from an funding standpoint, we’re far much less cash-reliant than every other EV startup that has ever existed, so far as I do know,” Snyder says.
As Slate tries to sprint to manufacturing with out tripping over the headstones of failed EV startups that litter the countryside, that leanness is vital. It’s helped them entice some main traders. “The best trade magnates to put money into our firm,” Snyder says. He declined to call names, however in accordance with a TechCrunch report, a type of magnates is Jeff Bezos.
“We don’t have a direct connection to Amazon,” Snyder clarified, however he didn’t rule out some company cooperation. “Who is aware of? Who is aware of when you’ll be capable to buy on Amazon? I don’t know.”
These vinyl wraps are actually simply the primary layer of what Slate’s designers are positioning as a, nicely, clean slate. They need house owners to personalize each side of the car, together with its silhouette.
Want room for greater than two passengers? Slate has an SUV improve package that can bolt onto the again of the truck, including additional rollover crash safety and rear seats with seat belts to match, all in a package deal that’s straightforward to put in at dwelling.
No, this isn’t a Subaru Brat redux. The seats can be forward-facing, and the entire setup is meant to be sturdy sufficient to fulfill crash take a look at laws. In truth, Slate’s head of engineering, Eric Keipper, says they’re concentrating on a 5-Star Security Ranking from the federal authorities’s New Automobile Evaluation Program. Slate can be aiming for a High Security Decide from the Insurance coverage Institute for Freeway Security.
This can be, largely, because of a complete energetic security system that features every part from computerized emergency braking with pedestrian detection to computerized excessive beams.
A compulsory a part of at the moment’s security options is a digital rear-view digital camera. Sometimes, this view pops up on a contemporary automobile’s central infotainment display screen, however the Slate doesn’t have a type of. It makes do with only a small show behind the steering wheel as a gauge cluster, which is the place that rearview digital camera will feed. You’ll have bodily knobs for controlling the in-cabin temperature controls plus the everyday flip stalk and different switchgear, however that’s about it.
The truck not solely lacks a touchscreen for infotainment duties, it lacks any type of leisure in any respect past no matter enjoyable you may get from the 201-horsepower, rear-drive configuration. There’s no radio, no Bluetooth, and no audio system of any form past for these required to play primary warning chimes.
Many will contemplate this a cost-cutting step too far, however the inside was designed for ease of upgrading, with straightforward mounting house for something from a easy soundbar to a full sound system.
There’s an built-in cellphone mount proper on the dashboard, however there’s nothing stopping you from bringing one thing even bigger. I count on the low-cost Android pill and 3D-printing communities to have a discipline day arising with in-car media streaming options.
The quite excessive omission of any form of media system within the automobile is jarring, however it, too, has secondary advantages.
“Seventy % of repeat guarantee claims are based mostly on infotainment at present as a result of there’s a lot tech within the automobile that it’s created a really unstable setting within the car,” Snyder says.
Eliminating infotainment, the speculation goes, essentially boosts reliability. And reliability can be key as a result of Slate is taking DIY to new extremes on the upkeep entrance, too.
The precise to restore your gadgets is a massively necessary subject for everybody from smartphone customers to sensible tractor operators. Historically, auto producers haven’t precisely gone out of their technique to make DIY upkeep straightforward, partly as a result of their sellers make a lot cash hawking cabin air filters and pointless coolant flushes.
As an EV, the upkeep schedule for Slate Truck must be minimal (most EVs don’t want way more than an annual tire rotation), however for any guarantee considerations, the corporate will encourage customers to do the fixes themselves. Not less than when it’s protected to take action.
“When you’re not going to interrupt the car and also you’re not going to injure your self, that means excessive voltage, you are able to do service and guarantee service in your car your self and have the movies and the helpline to assist you to do this work,” Snyder says.
That assist community can be known as Slate College and it’ll educate you every part it’s good to know. Don’t fancy your self a shade tree mechanic? Or possibly you don’t have a tree to park below within the first place? Slate has a partnership with already-established nationwide service facilities, the place house owners can take their vans for any wanted fixes. Upgrades might be carried out right here as nicely, together with putting in an extended-range battery that can convey the truck’s most vary as much as 240 miles.
“At begin of manufacturing, we can have protection throughout the nation for servicing your car,” Snyder says. Snyder declined to say who will present the service, however it appears affordable to count on one thing alongside the strains of a Midas, Monro, Meineke, or maybe another nationwide service chain that begins with the letter M.
And eventually, how will you purchase one? It ought to come as no shock that Slate will comply with Tesla’s footsteps by providing direct gross sales. No nationwide community of dealerships is deliberate. As a substitute, a restricted set of pickup facilities will pop up as wanted based mostly on preorder information. Or, when you don’t thoughts paying somewhat extra, dwelling supply can be accessible.
Preorders value simply $50 on Slate’s website, and deliveries are anticipated to begin in late 2026. Slate hasn’t stated precisely how a lot the truck will value, solely that it’ll be lower than $20,000 after federal incentives — assuming these incentives are nonetheless in place in 18 months’ time.
The larger query, although, is whether or not customers will really be into such a simplified imaginative and prescient of what a automobile might be. The Slate Truck is a rolling rejection of the present, bloated state of American motoring, however it’s shopper demand that’s pushed the market down this darkish alley. Are these customers prepared for a rolling digital detox?
