A £10k electric car with a 100-mile range would surely be a sales success

How’s this for a genuine, urgently required, unapologetically modest, game-changing product for consumers still sceptical about the financial and other implications of electric cars? I’m calling it the 10:100 and arguing that it could be the most intriguing, symbolically accessible pure-electric car - complete with a standard spec that’s light on luxuries, and heavy on value.

The 10:100 would, I believe, gently persuade millions of still understandably cautious consumers that they really can be painlessly eased into affordable little EVs without traumatising themselves or their wallets. Trouble is, in British showrooms at least, no such product currently exists. 

What I’m proposing is a stripped-out urban car (not a quadricycle, I hasten to add) that gets its 10:100 name courtesy of a £10k retail price and a 100-mile range. I confess I’m being a tad greedy because I’m expecting an entire electric car for around the same amount of money as a serious cyclist might pay for a hi-tech two-wheeler, or a ripped-off long-distance train commuter may have to stump up for an annual season ticket. But I’m being practical and realistic too, because the only way I could run a cheap EV for my slow, regular drives and commutes of only 10 or so miles, would be to have a petrol or hybrid car as back-up for higher-mileage trips. Know the feeling?   

If I turn mathematician for a moment, the 10:100 badge that I’m suggesting for my proposed car translates to a simple cost of £10k per 100 miles of range. This represents the affordable, potentially doable sweet spot, right? Er, maybe.   

Using an identical method of calculation (taking a car’s retail price and its claimed official range to work out how much it costs per 100 miles of range), the figure for the Citroen Ami quadricycle works out at almost £7,000 more expensive – at a shockingly high £16,728. The 2024 Auto Express Car of the Year, the Citroen e-C3, comes in at a far more palatable £11k, while a Tesla Model 3 Long Range RWD, although pricey at the point of purchase, works out at £10,318 per 100 miles of range.

But the clear and unexpected winner in this exercise is the Kia EV3, which will officially do 375 miles for £35,995 – therefore costing only £9,598 on identical terms. That’s impressively inexpensive for an EV. In terms of value for money of product, my calculator tells me that nothing beats this car at this price.  

That said, the idea of a £10k pure-electric car with a non-negotiable 100-mile range still floats my boat. Is any manufacturer out there brave enough to design, build and sell it in Blighty?

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