TESLA STORE: https://www.teslamotors.com/findus/location/store/rosspark

Buying one? Use my referral link for Free Supercharging: http://ts.la/matt327

Local owners/enthusiasts are encouraged to join our CLUB page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/TeslaPittsburgh/

Please note: We are not specifically authorized, sponsored by, or otherwise directly associated with Tesla Motors and make no claims to be so.

Friday, April 24, 2015

Pittsburgh Location Soon?

Well... look what I found...  A possible store coming to Ross Park Mall?
 I think I have something worth clicking through for....

Planning a trip to London and Finland this summer and was excited to see someone else tweet that Helsinki was getting a store/service center soon-- perhaps soon enough I could pay them a visit during our week there.

So tonight I was poking around the website (after logging the appropriate amount of what-if scenarios on the new Certified Pre-Owned Sales website OF COURSE) and decided to gaze through the job listings and...
                         ...I...
                                       ....found....
                                                                ...THIS.  <--- Click the link, DAVE.

Well, now... THAT is interesting, yes?   Pittsburgh has long been spoken of as getting a location soon-- "Service Plus" is how I've heard it described-- but this is the first tangible sign that Tesla is serious about doing it.
Pure speculation, but I would reason this is for a store in Ross Park Mall.  It's a Simon owned property that has, in the last 5 years or so, been grooming itself into a very upscale location.  I swear half the stores now are for expensive purses!  Ugh.   ANYWAY, the point is that it's a favorable demographic for Tesla and the location is near enough to get the city traffic AND the wealthier suburbs to the north (notably Cranberry Township, where there already is a Supercharger).
While a fancy garage in a fancy mall with a couple cars and skateboard chassis is a far cry from the touted "Service Plus" store, it would be a great place to start training up staff members.

Want a little more speculation?  Here goes...  Perhaps... PERHAPS... this is an indication that a suitable property has not been located for the Service Plus Center.   It's well known that given a choice, Tesla would rather take over a pre-existing car dealership.  If Tesla is interested in establishing their Pittsburgh area presence in the northern suburbs, there are few (if ANY) available car dealership type properties.  That would suggest Tesla might have to build a ground-up facility.  Such an undertaking would be a huge delay to their opening a Service Plus-- and would make an interim lease in a mall (and the associated costs of establishing the store) a viable stop-gap measure.

As a side possibility, there are several retail locations in the immediate area of Ross Park Mall that could be renovated to become a standalone store/service center.  I'm sure that most of these would require so much work that starting from scratch could end up being cheaper-- but they can't be ruled out.  One in particular caught my eye, as it tries to recover from horrific mismanagement under its prior ownership: http://theblocknorthway.com/

Most fantastical, of course, would be the possibility of building a full size location ONTO Ross Park Mall (like the Nordstrom's and LLBean stores have previously).  I can't imagine that there is parking room to spare on the mall property-- especially for new delivery and CPO stock-- but there are a couple peripheral buildings on the hilltop on the outside of the mall loop.  These places have dedicated parking and the proximity to the mall would be ideal, though I don't know if any are available or able to converted to Tesla's needs.

I can only hope.   I wonder if I could fit that part-time job into my full-time life.  Could be fun?

Full disclosure -- the pictures here are of the King of Prussia store near Philadelphia.

Thanks for visiting us here! CLICK to read more at www.TeslaPittsburgh.com, check out the videos on our YouTube channel at www.YouTube.com/NZCUTR and follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TeslaPittsburgh.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Comments are moderated-- yours will post once approved.