Ask nearly anyone, and so they’ll inform you that new automobiles are too costly. Within the wake of tariffs shaking the auto business 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 established order goes to take one thing radical, and it’s onerous to get extra radical than what Slate Auto has deliberate.
Meet the Slate Truck, a sub-$20,000 (after federal incentives) electrical automobile that enters manufacturing subsequent 12 months. It solely seats two but has a mattress sufficiently big to carry a sheet of plywood. It solely does 150 miles on a cost, solely is available in grey, and the one method to take heed to music whereas driving is should you convey alongside your cellphone and a Bluetooth speaker. It’s the naked minimal of what a contemporary automotive will be, and but it’s taken three years of growth to get so far.
However that is greater than bargain-basement motoring. Slate is presenting its truck as minimalist design with DIY function, an try and not simply go low-cost however to create a brand new class of car with an enormous deal with personalization. That design additionally permits a low-cost method to manufacturing that has caught the attention of main traders, reportedly together with Jeff Bezos. It’s been engineered and will probably be manufactured in America, however is that this excessive simplification an excessive amount of for American shoppers?
Simplify, Then Embrace Injury
If you happen to haven’t seen the leaks and the studies of weirdly wrapped vehicles 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 fundamental, extraordinarily customizable, and very inexpensive. These usually are not your typical design objectives, however then the Slate Truck isn’t the fruit of your typical design course of.
Wander by means of any automotive design studio anyplace on the planet and also you’ll inevitably come throughout a temper board or two, sweeping collages of placing photographs meant to align the artistic flows of passers-by. They’re a software for serving to a disparate design crew to create a cohesive product, however the place many such temper boards function glamour pictures of unique roads and exquisite individuals, entrance and middle within the Slate’s temper board was one thing totally different: an enormous, grey shark, coated in scrapes and scars.
“It seems to be like a shark that has undoubtedly been in multiple 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 moderately than hiding battle scars, is essential 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 colour all through. 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 business.
Slate continues the theme by means of to the upholstery, too, a heathered textile that was designed to get higher wanting because it wears. The concept is to lean into the aged aesthetic.
However not all people 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 automobile. Johnson says that is in distinction to the overly curated expertise provided by many manufacturers.
She says over-curation by automotive designers ends in conditions like premium, luxurious automobiles which might be solely obtainable in a palette of disappointingly bland colours: “There’s normally solely a fraction that you simply truly need, and people are at all times dearer,” she says.
Disparaging different manufacturers for providing restricted colour decisions might sound disingenuous coming from the designer of a automobile obtainable in a single shade. The Slate Truck, although, was designed to reap the benefits of the present pattern of vinyl-wrapping automobiles. Its easy form and minimal trim items imply that even amateurs can do the job. Slate will supply DIY kits that newbies can slap on in a day and change simply as shortly primarily based on temper.
Nonetheless, the largest good thing about this monochromatic pondering may are available in manufacturing.
Naked-Minimal Manufacturing
It’s most likely no shock to you that constructing automobiles is dear. Elon Musk likes to bemoan simply how sophisticated the method will be every time 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 automobiles. Making a facility that may reliably, shortly, and cleanly lay down a high quality coat of colour on automotive physique elements is a sophisticated process.
That process has solely gotten extra sophisticated (and thus costly) lately, with better environmental rules and client expectations forcing producers to search out methods to supply extra vibrant hues with much less ecological impression. Mercedes-Benz simply introduced it’s constructing a “Subsequent Era Paintshop” at its Sindelfingen plant in Germany, and estimates place the factor’s value at almost $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. “We now have no paint store, now we have 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 way simpler and cheaper to do in restricted areas — areas just like the manufacturing unit that Slate has bought for its manufacturing, reportedly close to Indiana. “The automobile is designed, engineered, and manufactured within the US, with nearly all of our provide chain primarily based within the US,” Snyder says.
The simplification goes easier nonetheless. Slate will make only one automobile, in only one trim, in only one colour, with every little thing from greater battery packs to SUV improve kits added on later.
“As a result of we solely produce one automobile within the manufacturing unit with zero choices, we’ve moved all the complexity out of the manufacturing unit,” 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 essential. It’s helped them entice some main traders. “The best business magnates to put money into our firm,” Snyder says. He declined to call names, however based on 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 should 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 homeowners to personalize each side of the automobile, together with its silhouette.
Want room for greater than two passengers? Slate has an SUV improve equipment that may bolt onto the again of the truck, including further rollover crash safety and rear seats with seat belts to match, all in a bundle that’s simple to put in at residence.
No, this isn’t a Subaru Brat redux. The seats will probably be forward-facing, and the entire setup is meant to be sturdy sufficient to fulfill crash check rules. In reality, Slate’s head of engineering, Eric Keipper, says they’re focusing on a 5-Star Security Ranking from the federal authorities’s New Automobile Evaluation Program. Slate can be aiming for a High Security Choose from the Insurance coverage Institute for Freeway Security.
This will probably be, largely, due to a complete lively security system that features every little thing from computerized emergency braking with pedestrian detection to computerized excessive beams.
A compulsory a part of as we speak’s security options is a digital rear-view digicam. Sometimes, this view pops up on a contemporary automotive’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 digicam 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 will get from the 201-horsepower, rear-drive configuration. There’s no radio, no Bluetooth, and no audio system of any variety past for these required to play fundamental warning chimes.
Many will contemplate this a cost-cutting step too far, however the inside was designed for ease of upgrading, with simple mounting area 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 developing with in-car media streaming options.
The moderately excessive omission of any type of media system within the automotive is jarring, nevertheless it, too, has secondary advantages.
“Seventy p.c of repeat guarantee claims are primarily based on infotainment at present as a result of there’s a lot tech within the automotive that it’s created a really unstable setting within the automobile,” Snyder says.
Eliminating infotainment, the speculation goes, essentially boosts reliability. And reliability will probably be key as a result of Slate is taking DIY to new extremes on the upkeep entrance, too.
The proper to restore your units is a massively necessary matter for everybody from smartphone customers to good tractor operators. Historically, auto producers haven’t precisely gone out of their method to make DIY upkeep simple, 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 ought to be minimal (most EVs don’t want far 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.
“If you happen to’re not going to interrupt the automobile 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 automobile your self and have the movies and the helpline to assist you to do this work,” Snyder says.
That assist community will probably be known as Slate College and it’ll educate you every little thing you’ll want to know. Don’t fancy your self a shade tree mechanic? Or perhaps you don’t have a tree to park underneath within the first place? Slate has a partnership with already-established nationwide service facilities, the place homeowners can take their vehicles for any wanted fixes. Upgrades will be carried out right here as nicely, together with putting in an extended-range battery that may convey the truck’s most vary as much as 240 miles.
“At begin of manufacturing, we could have protection throughout the nation for servicing your automobile,” Snyder says. Snyder declined to say who will present the service, nevertheless it appears affordable to count on one thing alongside the traces of a Midas, Monro, Meineke, or maybe another nationwide service chain that begins with the letter M.
And eventually, how are you going to 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 primarily based on preorder knowledge. Or, should you don’t thoughts paying just a little extra, residence supply will probably be obtainable.
Preorders value simply $50 on Slate’s web site, 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 shoppers will truly be into such a simplified imaginative and prescient of what a automotive will be. The Slate Truck is a rolling rejection of the present, bloated state of American motoring, nevertheless it’s client demand that’s pushed the market down this darkish alley. Are these shoppers prepared for a rolling digital detox?