I totally agree with the point's raised here. Surely supermarket's business model is built on delivery of good value, hence why their own forecourt petrol is so popular. I fairly often do long journeys through France in an EV, I have increasingly been using the excellent charging facilities at the French supermarkets near the motorways as they are typically 10-25% cheaper than service stations, and while there I'm also normally buying food and drink.
Dave, i think you’ve answered your own question. Given the supermarkets don’t now own the land / property /chargers therefore it’s not the supermarkets misreading the market - it’s simply retail park owners putting in charging points to tick the sustainability boxes for their operation. 🤔
This is absolutely correct. Dave stated this near the top of his analysis. Tesco etc no longer need to worry about the £ per Kwh. They are clearly delighted that someone is daft enough to invest huge sums of money on the infrastructure. It's a winwin for them whether they see a lot of use or not.
At even a moderately reasonable location a CPO will pay you in excess of £5k per bay per annum. I doubt the landowners care that much about ticking sustainability boxes but if they can get £40k a year for doing nothing then why wouldn't they?
Dave, I charge at home at less than 6p a kWh overnight, but if the supermarkets learn a lesson and brought their prices down, I might do the odd top up and would use them on long journeys. I think Bradley Stoke and every supermarket that are near motorways have a simple option to make money and that is drop price to 45-50p a kWh for ultra rapid chargers and the EV drivers would travel the extra distance from the motorway services to charge up. After all they could get a meal in the supermarket restaurant at far better prices than the motorway services, so the supermarkets would get a double win. The big barrier to public charging is not location, it’s simply price. If the EV charging networks weren’t so greedy they would make far more money
Supermarkets near trunk roads should realise they're in a prime location to capture EV drivers driving longer distances. Rather than fighting for chargers at services, I'm sure EV drivers wouldn't mind a couple of minutes' drive off of the road to charge at a supermarket - if it was reasonably priced. Stretch legs, grab a sandwich meal deal instead of an expensive service station burger, use the loos. Maybe grab some dinner for when they get home... Just needs reasonable pricing, and good advertising to attract the long distance motorist!
100% agree here. As soon as I saw these fast overpriced chargers appearing at super markets its was clear it was not going to work for most locations. I’m amazed that so many have been installed. Surely they must have done market research and realised that people who do a weekly shop normally do so at a super market close to home. I have said similar in some of your other videos about supermarket chargers and people tried to shoot me down in flames. It’s just so obvious that people who do a weekly shop are close to home so won’t need to fast charge at daft prices. I guess one or two locations may get used if they are close to trunks roads etc. 🤷♂️
I believe you're forgetting that petrol stations will disappear very quickly. Where will you charge in an unfamiliar location? In Sweden all you need to do is find a McDonald's or a large supermarket and you know you can charge. Supermarkets in the UK will be a part of this as well. They are not stupid 😂. It's obviously not for the person living 1km away.
There is a Sainsbury’s just of the A1 south on the way to London. I usually use IONITY at Baldock on the odd occasion I need a public charge but that store would be a backup option. Called in when we went to Harry Potter studios and they were all available. Did got a charge at the destination though.
The thing you're missing here is that the only people buying EVs now have a place to charge. As governments crack down and force these expensive toys on everyone there are lots of people who will have to buy them who can't, so having convenience of topping up as you grocery shop will be far more useful.
@@tangoadvance8393 I can only think that these will be useful for people who are not from the area but are visiting and want to do a bit of shopping. In that case though, they’ll need to be rapid chargers.
I agree Dave. Last week I was on a longer trip and needed to charge on route, I was stopping anyway for lunch and had a choice of charging at Sainsbury, MFG or Garden Centre. I chose the garden centre, chargers were the same (as Sainsbury) but 9p a kWh cheaper plus had a restaurant . No restaurant at MFG and Sainsbury had closed their cafe. Good value lunch , good toilets , after lunch (25 mins) back on the road with 90% charge, perfect.
As I live in a new construction housing estate I would like to challenge one comment, yes many of the homes have driveways and chargers but also some are terraced with no EV charging, so there is a nuanced argument. No one size fits all.
I think they do appear to have misread things. Perhaps Dave Takes It On could get an interview to enquire. I assume most viewers have already seen the 'Mr EV 'channels' interview with the person from Sainsbury's. Isn't it to some extent the other way around?... what I'm suggesting is that the supermarkets are expecting to attract people who are travelling so they come into the shop to use the toilets.. use the cafe and buy goods that they would otherwise have bought elsewhere. I do agree with what is being said on this Dave rant in the main of course. The chargers are meant to attract people to the shops rather than the existing shop goers being provided with a charging service. Charging needs to be cheaper to succeed at this in the same way that supermarket petrol is usually cheaper.
I remember about 10 months ago you said there was a charging price war coming as a result of Sainsburys putting chargers in many locations. While I hoped you were correct I thought at the time you were overly optimistic and said as much. It may still happen but not until the vast majority are driving EVs. That is very sadly a decade away yet, probbly at the same time all their petrol stations will be closing.
I think they'll mostly be used by company van drivers who are allocated a 30-45 minute lunch break and are less fussy about finding the cheapest rate. Connect up, go and buy your cheaper sarnie & drink from in the supermarket, use the toilet etc.
I shop at our local Sainbury's on a Saturday afternoon and rarely see any cars charging but car park is always chock ful, with several ICE cars in the electric bays.....
I once fitted a Sharps Bedroom for a guy that drove Petrol Tankers. He said that there is no difference between supermarket and "named" garage petrol/fuel, it all comes out of the same truck
I can see me using supermarket chargers whist on holiday somewhere in the UK. Convenient to get your holiday shopping done whilst charging. Fairly niche but would apply to many supermarkets in holiday destinations for maybe 1/2 the year. As you say the other thing they can do is offer money off like they still do for so much off per litre of petrol if you shop at a supermarket. IKEA used to have £5 off charging, I dont think they do that anymore.
The local Tesco has four Pod Point 7kw charge points. all installed as part of the VW penance after diesel gate. They were free for a while and in constant use, now they are priced at over 40p KWH they are mostly unused. Being only 1 mile from my home I have never used them. My 'go to' public charging is either on long trips therefore M/Way, or occasionally the destination chargers in a public car park at Swanage, at 35pKWH. With my previous car I used a rapid at a Lidl store en route, now I can do the entire trip in one go. I have used the Pod Point chargers at Tesco Chesterfield in spite of their limited time , but on my last trip I used the Ionity rapids at the nearby football club.(Time was more important than money , unusually) My suggestion for supermarkets, and other destinations , is to find a business model that emphasises the convenience of charge as you park and do life.
Yeah this is exactly the issue I've seen with supermarkets. I recently had to go a month using public chargers as my home charger stopped working, surprisingly wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, I had to use a BP Pulse 4 bay hub next to an M&S and Sainsbury's which wasn't cheap but got by. They really need to reevaluate where they invest in these rapid charge hubs. They should be in supermarkets in areas with a lot of street only parking or destination towns like coastal towns in the south west were large numbers of tourist would need to use them while on holiday. That said all of this still relies on a big reduction in the cost.
Dave, your thesis is ok if you live in a semi or a detached house with your own garage or parking space, but if you are like me living in a flat several floors above a parade of shops on a main road or in a tower block, a chance to charge while doing the weekly shop, or in a local car park, and in my case need a CHAD-e-MO
Why charge when you pop to the supermarket when you can charge for 7p per KWh at home. My local supermarkets are within the 300 mile round trip range of my car. I used to shop at Tesco even though it was further away than Morrison's, as I had a free top up charge. Now I have to pay to charge, I go to Morrisons instead of Tesco's as it's closer. Incentive to shop at Tesco's has been taken away and I have never had to use the rapid charger at Morrisons.
Free was always a bad idea, the chargers were usually full and they had maybe 4 tops, so not exactly encouraging flood of people into the store. My local shopping mall gets it right, they have a bank of slow chargers which are generally always full, they are at a reasonable price though, about 35p, and its the sort of mall people go to for several hours.
@@robertedge6326 Everyone loves a bargain. My EV has been the biggest bargain and cost saving I have ever made. Saving me a fortune. 1.4p per mile on Octopus intelligent Go tariff or free with my solar panels and Zappi charger all summer.😂😂😂 Carry on being ripped off for petrol and diesel you fool. 🤡
@@robertedge6326 Because I'm a good citizen and I put my life on the line for the good of the government and country by driving a self combustible...at any moment EV for them. I should get a medal for bravery and free fuel everywhere.
Totally agree. I live in New Malden, the nearest Tesla charger is in Kingston (6 miles away), Sainsbury Cobham is currently installing 12 chargers, Tesco Extra New Malden has one rapid charger & three slow. which see to be frequently used. Merton council is installing 'Lampost chargers' (There's one outside where I live but it doesn't have a marked EV bay 😵💫) Meanwhile the council is dragging its feet on allowing residents to install cable channels across the pavement outside their homes. (Could be a nice little earner for channel iinstallers there)
The only supermarket local to me that has charging is Morrisons and they have a solitary 50kW charger, it was out of order for several months but is now working again, complete with tap-to-pay card reader. I'm told that Sainsburys may be having some installed but no indication as to when. Like most things when it comes to EV charging it seems to be hit and miss geographically.
All of Morrisons chargers seem to be the same. 1 50kw that are hit and miss if they are working. I rarely need a public charger but experience has taught me to avoid Morrisons.
We have a Sainbury's with six chargers and a mile down the road a 24 service station with a small Co-op, Gregg's and Starbucks with a other six chargers. Hardly ever see anyone using them as it's bang in the middle of three housing estates.......
Unless these become cost effective they’ll never get used. It would be better business for then to lower prices and actually get some money back in doing so!
We only use public chargers as we live in an apartment and our landlord refuses to put a charger in. We either use ESB (46ppkwh) or Monta (23ppkh) both are 22kw chargers. We always use chargers near places we are going to be for a while. Being in Northern Ireland, we don't have many chargers (it's woeful here), but we can still get charging done. However we've not come across many supermarket chargers. I can only think of one, and that was in Belfast (a little far for us in Derry). There are almost no Tesla chargers here either
I am genuinely surprised that more places don’t offer free slow charging to attract more customers. Nothing expensive, or fancy, Just a simple low amp plug. If I had to choose between 2 identical stores, I would always pick the one with the plug.
You can charge in the car park in Leicester Highcross. I went to try it out but they are 3pin so you need a granny charger. Not sure but I think that is approx 3-4 kWh supply so it isn’t costing them a lot.
Free never works. A discounted rate when spend decent amount in store that is good. A 3kW plug is not worth plugin in for a 30 minute shop, the only people that will use it are those that will abuse it and spend many hours at them (when they even could charge at home). Free is a terrible idea.
I was one of the 70% who could charge at home, but my EV had realistically only 90 miles of range, so when I had that, I was always looking out for a place to at least slow charge for free or cheap. The range of the car dictates whether you need to public charge as well as whether you have a drive, it might be a fairly medium distance or a few trips on the same day that force a public charge.
I was in the summer at our local Lidl and saw a couple of managers walking round pointing at different things and said to them about the new chargers they had and I said if you were to make them cheaper for someone who did a big shop and could get a discounted top up and they said it sounded interesting and the might bring it up at a meeting. I wonder if they did??
Tesco, Sainsbury's etc all have membership cards. Why not provide a deal of spend e.g. £25 in-store and get a charging rate that is close to home charging (e.g. 4 p more so that you don't have the 70% with home charging clogging up spaces). Alternatively, provide the offer above in addition to a cheap monthly membership that provides cheap charging. Then fit 22 kW AC chargers at all parking spots in addition to 5 to 10 350 kW chargers for those on the go. 22 kW because most aren't charging from 0% to full and they tend to visit the store regularly. Government should mandate all cars to come with minimum of 22 kW AC charging and AC charging port on both sides of the car. DC charging can be on one side of the car. Repeat at all places with parking spots.
Only discovered your channel last week. I really appreciate your perspective Dave - realistic and helpful. I find supermarkets awful. Morrisons where I work had 2 rapid Genie point chargers, neither of which worked for 18 months. They might still not, I stopped even looking a year ago. Sainsbury's has 10 fast chargers - which don't work 90% of the time and are usually blocked by staff parking their cars. Our big Tesco has one rapid and 4 fast chargers - all Podpoint. The rapid charger has been out of order for 6 months and didn't work for much of the previous year. The fast chargers are blocked by taxis charging most of the day and evening. So my experience of empty chargers is because they don't work!
Btw I don't have home charging, and many people in my area of London simply can't either. We do have around 80 on street chargers in our borough which is good. I am in year 5 of an EV - still love it despite the inconvenience of public charging and the massive increase in charging costs
Our local Morrison has a single 50kW charger that was also out of order for months. They have now upgraded it to take tap-to-pay card payments, and it is working again. This was presumably done to comply with the Public Charge Point Regulations.
I have used a Sainsburys rapid charger in Bishop Auckland as it’s convenient for the Locomotion railway museum. The cafe in the store has been closed though.
M&S are partnered with BP Pulse. Big stores get 50Kw dispensers .. the small select stores in BP Fuel stations get 150Kw dispensers. Works well for me at 57p
Our local Supermarket is Fred Meyer (in Oregon), and we buy all our petrol there as they give a discount up to $1 a gallon for buying groceries at the store. But now we have an EV for 90% of our driving and rarely have to fill our remaining gas vehicle. They did have a couple of Lvl 2 chargers (7.6kW), but both have been vandalized months ago and not fixed. _IF_ they had working chargers, and they worked out cheaper than charging at home (2 miles away) with a discount for being a customer, we'd use them. But they don't. There are some chargers at another Feed Meyer further away, but they charge 5x what we pay at home, so no reason to use them.
I was deliberately shopping from Tesco's when they were offering free charging of 7kw. I probably stayed longer or at least take it easy in the supermarket which was most likely increasing my shopping totals. I no longer go to Tesco's, because there is a Lidl closer. I don't think I am the only one.
A lot depends on what they think the catchment area of the supermarket is. There are several areas of Bristol that have lots of terraced roads and so little off street parking. Bedminster, Southville, Totterdown etc. Supermarkets serving these areas probably would benefit from having chargers on site.
Great video, dave. i think sainsburys are expensive. However, they allow you to add cost to the nectar card, so in a roundabout way, you can get a bit off your local shopping, i guess.
Any supermarket that doesn't supply EV charging is missing a major trick. However placing them close by the shop entrance is a major mistake, as lazy idle ICE drivers park their cars in the bays. The only two times I tried to charge at Aldi in Buxton I was not able to find a EV charger. Out of 5 or 6 there was only one EV parked by a charger and even that wasn't plugged in :-(
Go into the store customer service desk and tell them that car with registration number parked in the EV bays but not charging appears to have been damaged by somebody …………..
Some supermarket chargers near me, in Chicago, have free charging. The chargers are slow and always busy. Unless you’re shopping, they are a big waste of time.
I use Tesco for the Pod point charger, it has very nice parking spaces, close to the store and generous space, yes costs about £1 in charging, or free if you just take 5 mins, yes I am a man and I rapid shop.
I was speaking to someone in a car dealership and he is going to Costco to save 7- 10p/litre on fuel. I was surprised because he is 25miles away but I assume when he is in town. However, I drive 3 miles to use Tesla at 41p
When charging at my local Tesco was free, I used to plug in and pop in store several times a week, never had to use my home charger. I probably spent a fortune in Tesco. Since free charging ended, I go to Tesco less than once a month, for things I can’t get in Aldi.
i went to tesco and could not get on chargers when free. now I have been past or to Tesco and almost all are empty. even at 44p for 7kw. can in some places be more expensive than other charges. I would say Scotland were you can pay as little as 30p for a 7kw or 37p for a 50kw. so why pay 44p or more
I don’t own a drive way and use public chargers. If the charge is cheaper then I would use a slower charger depending on the shop. I love type 2 if it’s cheaper. Unless I’m not there long enough.
I don’t think you have it quite right Dave. The cost of installing ultra-rapid chargers is enormous. Nobody is going to be charging 40p while they still have huge upfront costs to recoup and much higher standing charges from the DNO, not to mention the obvious 20% VAT that the government will never give up, as they know the switch to electric will make a huge dent in their fuel duty income. If anything the government will try to find a way to charge 20% vat on home charging. What is needed is a proper plan. A small number of rapid chargers that are accessible without going in the main car park and multiple 50kW chargers for customers who are shopping at a reduced price.
Wait until more and more vans become electric, especially the large fleet ones. Most of the lads at my place use supermarket or retail charging, as they get to shop /grab lunch while charging.
I went to have a look at a couple of chargers in a car park near where I go quite frequently. What surprised me was that you have to pay the parking fee while you are charging. Is this common? I would have thought that parking would be free while you are charging.
We visit Bradley Stoke on a regular basis but charge at Cribs Causeway and do our shopping there at the same time, never used the BS site, no point in stopping twice, I guess if the price for charging was in the 40 pence range then maybe we would as we have to go right past it to get where we are going.
Agreed I would travel to a cheaper filling station especially if it also gave me extra points. For this I had to make a special trip that took 20 minutes from home. Thankfully with home charging I can top up my EV whilst I sleep and do so at just 7p. If supermarkets did give 30p per kWh I would definitely use them on longer journeys. As it is they are too expensive. Again for those with no off road charging available may use it, but again it needs to be cheaper for them.
So true, I think most forms of public EV charging is crazy overpriced when compared to Petrol/Diesel... Rapid charging should not be any more expensive than ICE fuel, and the slower charging types incrementally cheaper... it needs more regulation in terms of what companies can charge, my local train station charges 80p pkw (equal to £2.40 a litre) for a 7kw charging speed, ridiculous pricing, there are 10 charging points that are never used, I contacted the company and they said they're looking into it... they must love not making any money!
I think supermarkets are thinking beyond parking EVs and supermarkets. It makes no sense to allocate so much land for parking when goods sales & delivery will be automated to much higher levels, and land remains a premium for people to live on.
Ah, the halcyon days of 2019 when I used to get a free rapid charge at lidl. They need to go back to a similar idea where AC charging is a loss leader. About 5p per kWh sounds about right, that would increase footfall to the shops . No point in getting the cable out of the boot otherwise.
What gets me is most supermarkets have acres of roofs yet very little if any solar the 2 well known supermarkets in my area have none. As for supermarkets having cheaper fuel my local independent undercuts supermarkets as the supermarkets are ripping off the public.
The supermarkets don't have a 2 hour limit at 4am.... A lot of supermarkets now have the ANPR cameras and "outside store hours" the time limit is only 15 minutes :)
Charging would have to be 40p per kWh to compete with an average diesel car. 70 kW usable battery x 40p = £28.00. A realistic range of 250 miles would return 11.2p per mile.
If the supermarket isn't open 24hrs then they aren't going to do any business by opening the car park overnight. Supermarkets probably don't really want cars on their car park when they're closed because of antisocial behaviour and the risk that it just becomes overnight parking. They could try to limit access to just the chargers, but a lot of car parks just have an ANPR reader at the entrance that records cars in and out but not where they park. If the supermarket or at least the landowner is leasing out the charging bays and generating an income from it, then are they even that bothered about whether or not they get used (some lease deals are flat rate, others include an element of profit share). Are the likes of Sainsbury really operating their own chargers or are they still leasing out the spaces and just co-branding with a CPO.
Yeah it would be a hassle offering parking/charging overnight for free for them. Antisocial behaviour, no benefit (sales) to them, etc as you say. I believe Sainsburys really do have they own CPO. Also Asda and Morrisons have partnerships with MFG (EV power) and EG (ev point/on the move).
Our local Tesco is on a large retail park and have 6 EV chargers, which cost 44p per kw. Sounds good but there are a couple of problems with them though, which may be why they are rarely used. Firstly they are 7kw chargers and the maximum stay in the retail park where they are situated is 3 hours, but only the first 2 hours are free, you have to pay for the extra hour. There are many reports on the car park website (Not owned or run by Tesco) of people who did not realise that the third hour was payable until they found a parking ticket for £60. Secondly the retail park is locked from 22.00 until 7.00 so you could not leave your car there overnight, even if you wanted to. No wonder the charging infrastructure in this country is so poor.
Dave, this is your best video yet. Damn good analysis. BTW I don't understand why Hotels and B&Bs aren't falling over themselves to install fast chargers, that could be used overnight. SOme do, but often the hotel itself is more expensive than the competition: in which case I'll stay in the cheaper hotel and then charge at the Tesco Pod Point.
I'm the same, I don't choose a £200 per night hotel just to get free charging. If it's just an overnight on a road trip, I can get something plenty nice enough for half that and use a different charger enroute.
Similar to the supermarkets they have often sold the rights to manage their car parks and use fines as a revenue stream. So many contradictory pressures.
Local Morrisons has a 2 cable CCS dispenser asking 79p/kW, down the road is a Premier Inn asking the same for using their 4 x 50kW charger cables. Round the corner from Morrusons and directly across the road is a CPS charge hub wanting 55p.kW on the 50kW/22kwAC combo chargers and 30p/kW on the slow 7kW posts. The land owner at Morrusons and Premier must be wondering why there are NEVER any EVs using their facilities. Needless to say I don’t use any of the chargers as we have even cheaper 7kW charging in our village but I have home charging and a car that does 135 miles on a 60% charged battery. Even the CPS chargers in town are rarely all in use - there are 5 x 50kW and 10 x 7kW, in 2021 when I bought my 1st EV I never charged at home because the chargers in town were all free to use if you didn’t mind waiting in the queue.
I don't even bother to go to the supermarket, just do it online, lot less hassle. Charge EV at home with occasional away charging at Tesla open to all sites.
I think they missed the point, obviously they just want to maintain the status quo set yesteryear I imagine there are economic interests wanting to maintain things as they are. We charge at home to avoid being ripped off by the likes of Gridserve, Instavolt or Applegreen. On a happier note, I downloaded the latest Tesla update, V12.2024.44.3.1, now I get offered a range of parking spots, I pressed the spot I fancied (bit of a tight squeeze to get into) and lo and behold the car nipped into the spot like it was on greased tracks ! Well impressed. Cost of this update, nowt !
I go on approximately a 22 mile round trip to use a Tesla Charger at 39p per KHW rather than 1 mile to the local supermarket charge at much greater cost.
I don't think you can have a price war when you're selling a product to people who don't care about the cost because it's almost a one-off. It's like bottled water, you buy it when you are thirsty and far from home. Cost is secondary.
@ . But this is the problem - you’re basing it the present owners -who can charge at home. There’s a whole part of the community that can’t - until this is addressed, EV’s will never go above 50% adoption.
Maybe drop the price to 45p/kWh (cheaper with a monthly subscription, eg 30p/kWh) and they should attract customers without home charging, and also holiday makers, and anyone on a trip to relatives etc, who need a topup...including those with home charging? Nectar points?
More and more people will need a public charger. Most of the early adopters can charge at home. 40-50% of people in the UK can't charge at home apparently because they have no parking lot at their home.
That’s a made up figure I’m afraid. The official government data says can already charge at home 65% cannot at present charge at home 35% but about 5% have access to workplace charging so don’t need home charging and 10% could charge at home with pavement gullies or overhead cables or similar technologies. Only around 10-15% will end up totally excluded.
@@davetakesiton"off road parking" is not the same as parking on the drive and neither automatically Mac that a charge point can be installed. The figure will be much less than the oft trotted out figure of people that can charge at home.
@davetakesiton I do indeed drive a petrol car. It is much cheaper to buy in the first place and has 4 times the range of the EV I had which means it can be our only car. When my EV was written off I considered getting a new one as they seemed cheaper to run. But the prices off them were going up and up, electric charging prices too, now road tax... I don't see the incentive anymore.
The majority of the UK housing stock is terraced housing, so they won't be really able to charge at home so that percentage will increase for usage so this could be what supermarkets are waiting for
Wow! Why so negative? No, the truth is quite the opposite. The majority of housing is not terraced. Many now have workplace charging so do not need to charge at home. Some terraced do have off street parking., some even have garages. My local council has just approved pavement gullies and announced a massive installation programme of lamp post chargers for the rest who can’t charge at home.
The highest figure I have seen for homes without off-road parking is 45%, the typical figure quoted is around 30%, still high but not the majority you suggest. There are around 20% of homes where there is no car ownership, and I suspect there will be a significant crossover between homes without cars and homes without parking.
@@davetakesiton The gullies are a good start and I think the Government should step in and take the decision about installing these out of the hands of local councils so that they are automatically approved. Even these are not a perfect solution as they still require you to be able to get into the space outside your house and, as anyone who has ever lived in in one of these types of houses will know parking is first come first served and getting the space outside your own house is hit and miss. Gullies are also useless on those estates where there is no road in front of the house, there are lots of council estates that were built like this in the 60's and early 70's. We still need to progress the affordable and convenient charging solutions.
Just like petrol - who cares! As long as the charger works I don’t care who it belongs to. Price is another issue as you say. If I’m buying whilst “on the road” I will choose the cheapest. Today this is Tesla.
I normally charge at work, (a warehouse) and it is free (7 kw max - bring your own lead). If the supermarkets put in free 7 kw units in large numbers they would attract lots of people they do not get at present. This was the main reason for the petrol pump stations. I doubt it would cost supermarkets very much, and surely they pay much less for their own power.... I bet they make a lot more overall profit per visit.... Fossil Fuel Fanatics might see the light...
Supermarkets pay more for their power than domestic houses. They are not capped the same way like domestic supply (what is that about 25p atm). I'm not sure free could ever work for them or should it be free. People will not bother for a 30 minute for doing actual shopping and will abuse it any stay for hours and walk away even if they could charge at home. Why should they give away tens of pounds for very little return?
Supermarkets are one of the best places to install a combination of rapid and slower chargers. This way they can attract both EV drivers who can't charge at home and those that can. Those that can't charge at home can use the rapid chargers to give themselves a pretty much complete top up while they shop. Those who can charge at home would be tempted in with free or very cheap slow charging. The Government should be making legislation to drive this and supporting Supermarkets in getting the installations in. Most importantly the price per kWh needs to enable charging at a cheaper than petrol or diesel equivalent price. As Supermarkets often have large outdoor car parks they'd also be well suited to solar canopies and storage battery installations too. This would help where grid connections wouldn't normally be able to support multiple rapid chargers and give Supermarkets another revenue stream.
Free charging is no revenue stream for them. Why should they give away about £3 an hour (7kW chargers at business electricity rates @ 40-50p per kW) for electricity for nothing?
@johnbaker5533 I guess you haven't worked in retail or know what a loss leader is. I remember the baked bean price wars in the 90's. All to get people in the door and increase revenue.
@@leegoodman297 of course I understand loss leaders. But it to work people you have to get people through the doors. Buying a max of 4 tins of beans and losing a few pence on each one is understandable as you are entering the store and will likely buy something else. They could offer a voucher for reduced charging a slow chargers maybe even free for an hour if you spend £50 or something. Previously the free charging was so abused people would plug in all day and not shop there.
@johnbaker5533 I had a similar scheme to getting free parking when you shop in mind for the free charging. Number plate recognition technology or signing into an app would enable an EV driver to start charging and once they'd shopped and given in their registration plate or scanned an app QR code the charging session would be discounted or free depending on the amount spent in store. That way the Supermarket doesn't lose out in any scenario and customers would get a free or discounted charging session.
@@leegoodman297 Yeah I'm fine with solutions like that. They are sensible solutions that suit both sides. We need that instead of the "it should be free" camp of (entitled) people. Spending £50 for a 30 minute charger can be free. Spending just 80p on a Mars bar for 3 hours free will not be.
Id drive past 3 petrol stations to save a penny per litre, you bet il drive an extea 10 miles to use a tesla chargingstation. Out of pure principle alone.
@@StephenButlerOne Right? This person is voluntarily paying 50% extra for fuel, for what? I genuinely don't understand why people hate Elon so much, I'd love to be informed
The people who have currently got EVs are early adopters, these people are almost certainly relatively well off and have their own drives and can charge at home. As the market develops more and more people will eventually purchase second or third or more hand electric cars and they will frequently have less access to EV charging at home. My guess is half the places people live in the UK are not well geared up for home charging. Those are the people who will benefit from supermarket charging. Not the early adopters. It only will require one supermarket chain not be run by a moron and they will show the way for EV charging, and the others will then have to fall into line. One other thought. People make money by purchasing something say electricity for 8p per unit and selling it for more. If I had a home charger and I only used it one night per week on the other 6, I could let others use it. If I charged 30p per unit I would be making 22p per unit for not doing much say £15 per night x 6 I could in theory be making £90 per week for letting them charge at my house. I think this is a possibility which would for some people solve their charging issues / costs. In some parts of the country people already rent out their drives for parking. - Just a thought.
IMO most people are not as interested in charging cost as you Dave. I really don't think many care or pay much attention to the price of fuel for their car, or charge for their EV. These chargers must be making money for the operators otherwise they would surely just remove them?
I think that you have missed the point about charging when travelling. I don't want to charge at motorway services when I'm on the road because they are expensive and unpleasant places. I would much rather pull a couple of miles off the main road/motorway and charge at a garden centre, farm shop, supermarket or shopping centre. As I do 95% of my charging at home I'm not that price-sensitive when on the road but I still won't pay more than 79p of course. This leaves me plenty of choice for pleasant places to charge. I've used Smart Charge (Sainsburys) several times on the road and have been very happy with the overall service - the supermarket food cost saving more than offsets the 75p (not 79p) premium price so you have to look at the big picture. Sainsbury are already offering Nectar points on charging so I'm expecting that their business model will evolve over time probably directed at drivers who cannot charge at home.
Like you in excess of 95% of my miles come from home charging, unlike you I will charge at motorway services for convenience. This type of charging accounts for so little of my mileage that the high price isn't significant in the overall picture and I going to be stopping for the toilet anyway. I also accept that I will be paying over the odds for the food and drink at the services but again it is so infrequent it just isn't an issue. I rarely used the filling station at services but if I was on an exceptionally long journey that required refuelling, I would pay service station prices. My guess is that a lot of people use motorway services chargers because they know that they are likely to be working and that they are convenient.
Free in general is poor as it encourages bad practices. Even those that can charge at home would hog chargers for hours when they didn't need to just to say a quid. Free slow charging at the supermarket was a nightmare people would stay as long as possible, go walk around town do other things or not bother at all as a 20-30 minute stop at a slow charger while shopping is barely worth it for the extra time it takes to get your cable out and plug in. Rapid Supermarket charger is too expansive but often locally people without home charging have limited options. Sure they might be one 10 miles out of the way to charge but a supermarket is somewhere you likely need to visit any and a rapid would make sense once a week to fill up while you shop for 30 minutes. If it is slightly more expensive even I can see people using them once more people who cannot charge at home buy in larger numbers.
The stores should put in 50KW chargers at 50p. Then, let you earn free minutes with your purchases. People would plug in for free. They may even pay a little if they overstay their free minutes. But use the cheap chargers to attract flat dwellers to the store. And give free minutes to get homeowners to use their chargers.
The recent standard range Model 3s have LFP batteries. I’m not sure if it applies to all. Another aoption is to ask the question on the Tesla Motors Club forum.
If 70% of EV drivers charge at home, that means 30% have to. It also means some of the 70% charge at public chargers. EG business users with Tesla etc probably don't charge at home because a) it is a pain to do the expenses and B) it is paid via the company so they don't care. So I'd say about 50% of people use public chargers. I use Tesla at 41p for my E-Nero @Tesla Glasgow but I then go to the nearest supermarket for stuff. I have used Tesco in some locations (Elgin) because it was 50p and had breakfast. I would NEVER use a supermarket charger unless it is good value. If they made it good value I would go there and buy my shopping. I don't want something for nothing. I would even pay a £10 EV subscription. I did this on IONITY to bring the price down from 74p to 43p and used that all the time before Tesla Glasgow opened p to non Tesla.
I think most people would be surprised how many viewers tell me they never ever charge at public chargers. While I tend to agree with you, most drivers will only charge at a public charger once or twice a year
@@davetakesiton I live in a flat in Glasgow. I should have said 30% have to use public chargers all the time. I can't charge at home so we have to use public chargers. I sometimes use them 3x a week.
I agree, but offering discounts in the same way that some supermarkets do on fuel if you have a loyalty card and spend over a certain amount on your shop doesn't seem unreasonable. Supermarkets could also offer it as something of a loss leader if they thought they could profit elsewhere from it, again something that happens anyway.
@@djtaylorutube I only use Tesla chargers. And if a space for nine cars is taken up by three because they're wrongly packed it's infuriating for other users. So it's not fine as they are they need to change the charging system so that everyone can have a chance for charging.
@issiewizzie or the wrong siders could go elsewhere or be blocked entirely until they lobby their manufacturer to put the port on the correct side. Or Our Lord Elon could just close access again. 😉
I totally agree with the point's raised here. Surely supermarket's business model is built on delivery of good value, hence why their own forecourt petrol is so popular. I fairly often do long journeys through France in an EV, I have increasingly been using the excellent charging facilities at the French supermarkets near the motorways as they are typically 10-25% cheaper than service stations, and while there I'm also normally buying food and drink.
Dave, i think you’ve answered your own question. Given the supermarkets don’t now own the land / property /chargers therefore it’s not the supermarkets misreading the market - it’s simply retail park owners putting in charging points to tick the sustainability boxes for their operation. 🤔
This is absolutely correct. Dave stated this near the top of his analysis. Tesco etc no longer need to worry about the £ per Kwh. They are clearly delighted that someone is daft enough to invest huge sums of money on the infrastructure. It's a winwin for them whether they see a lot of use or not.
At even a moderately reasonable location a CPO will pay you in excess of £5k per bay per annum. I doubt the landowners care that much about ticking sustainability boxes but if they can get £40k a year for doing nothing then why wouldn't they?
Dave, I charge at home at less than 6p a kWh overnight, but if the supermarkets learn a lesson and brought their prices down, I might do the odd top up and would use them on long journeys. I think Bradley Stoke and every supermarket that are near motorways have a simple option to make money and that is drop price to 45-50p a kWh for ultra rapid chargers and the EV drivers would travel the extra distance from the motorway services to charge up. After all they could get a meal in the supermarket restaurant at far better prices than the motorway services, so the supermarkets would get a double win. The big barrier to public charging is not location, it’s simply price. If the EV charging networks weren’t so greedy they would make far more money
Most EVs could get a reasonable number of extra miles on 20-30min charge out of a 22KWh charger. This is the market supermarkets should be targeting.
Supermarkets near trunk roads should realise they're in a prime location to capture EV drivers driving longer distances. Rather than fighting for chargers at services, I'm sure EV drivers wouldn't mind a couple of minutes' drive off of the road to charge at a supermarket - if it was reasonably priced. Stretch legs, grab a sandwich meal deal instead of an expensive service station burger, use the loos. Maybe grab some dinner for when they get home...
Just needs reasonable pricing, and good advertising to attract the long distance motorist!
Sainsbury’s Smart Charge fits this category with plentiful and reliable chargers. Also available 24/7
@tungro absolutely spot on mate 🤛
100% agree here. As soon as I saw these fast overpriced chargers appearing at super markets its was clear it was not going to work for most locations. I’m amazed that so many have been installed. Surely they must have done market research and realised that people who do a weekly shop normally do so at a super market close to home. I have said similar in some of your other videos about supermarket chargers and people tried to shoot me down in flames. It’s just so obvious that people who do a weekly shop are close to home so won’t need to fast charge at daft prices.
I guess one or two locations may get used if they are close to trunks roads etc. 🤷♂️
I believe you're forgetting that petrol stations will disappear very quickly. Where will you charge in an unfamiliar location?
In Sweden all you need to do is find a McDonald's or a large supermarket and you know you can charge. Supermarkets in the UK will be a part of this as well. They are not stupid 😂.
It's obviously not for the person living 1km away.
There is a Sainsbury’s just of the A1 south on the way to London. I usually use IONITY at Baldock on the odd occasion I need a public charge but that store would be a backup option. Called in when we went to Harry Potter studios and they were all available. Did got a charge at the destination though.
The thing you're missing here is that the only people buying EVs now have a place to charge. As governments crack down and force these expensive toys on everyone there are lots of people who will have to buy them who can't, so having convenience of topping up as you grocery shop will be far more useful.
@@tangoadvance8393 I can only think that these will be useful for people who are not from the area but are visiting and want to do a bit of shopping. In that case though, they’ll need to be rapid chargers.
I agree Dave. Last week I was on a longer trip and needed to charge on route, I was stopping anyway for lunch and had a choice of charging at Sainsbury, MFG or Garden Centre. I chose the garden centre, chargers were the same (as Sainsbury) but 9p a kWh cheaper plus had a restaurant . No restaurant at MFG and Sainsbury had closed their cafe. Good value lunch , good toilets , after lunch (25 mins) back on the road with 90% charge, perfect.
As I live in a new construction housing estate I would like to challenge one comment, yes many of the homes have driveways and chargers but also some are terraced with no EV charging, so there is a nuanced argument. No one size fits all.
I think they do appear to have misread things. Perhaps Dave Takes It On could get an interview to enquire. I assume most viewers have already seen the 'Mr EV 'channels' interview with the person from Sainsbury's.
Isn't it to some extent the other way around?... what I'm suggesting is that the supermarkets are expecting to attract people who are travelling so they come into the shop to use the toilets.. use the cafe and buy goods that they would otherwise have bought elsewhere. I do agree with what is being said on this Dave rant in the main of course. The chargers are meant to attract people to the shops rather than the existing shop goers being provided with a charging service. Charging needs to be cheaper to succeed at this in the same way that supermarket petrol is usually cheaper.
Totally. The price to charge is a ripoff and no cheaper than petrol
Exactly. Garages will die because they cannot survive when most people charge at home.
McD have already taken huge market share in Scandinavia.
I remember about 10 months ago you said there was a charging price war coming as a result of Sainsburys putting chargers in many locations. While I hoped you were correct I thought at the time you were overly optimistic and said as much. It may still happen but not until the vast majority are driving EVs. That is very sadly a decade away yet, probbly at the same time all their petrol stations will be closing.
I think they'll mostly be used by company van drivers who are allocated a 30-45 minute lunch break and are less fussy about finding the cheapest rate. Connect up, go and buy your cheaper sarnie & drink from in the supermarket, use the toilet etc.
It’s a bit of a Catch 22 with rapid chargers - they set the high price because of the cost of installing them but at that price they’re rarely used
Spot on!
they'll have to take a loss if they want them used , subsidised by main business
I shop at our local Sainbury's on a Saturday afternoon and rarely see any cars charging but car park is always chock ful, with several ICE cars in the electric bays.....
I once fitted a Sharps Bedroom for a guy that drove Petrol Tankers. He said that there is no difference between supermarket and "named" garage petrol/fuel, it all comes out of the same truck
I have worked at refineries and you see tankers of every brand filling up with same fuel.
Just want to say
Thank you Dave
You do make it make sense
All your TH-cam are clear and worth a watch
Kind regards J
Hi Dave. Have to say I love your enthusiasm and knowledge you are the future I am of the same mindset, love your channel. Thank you.
I can see me using supermarket chargers whist on holiday somewhere in the UK. Convenient to get your holiday shopping done whilst charging. Fairly niche but would apply to many supermarkets in holiday destinations for maybe 1/2 the year. As you say the other thing they can do is offer money off like they still do for so much off per litre of petrol if you shop at a supermarket. IKEA used to have £5 off charging, I dont think they do that anymore.
Dave, your analysis of EV cars and the future being confused is totally correct. And it’s not being helped by Jaguar and its recent disaster.
The local Tesco has four Pod Point 7kw charge points. all installed as part of the VW penance after diesel gate. They were free for a while and in constant use, now they are priced at over 40p KWH they are mostly unused. Being only 1 mile from my home I have never used them.
My 'go to' public charging is either on long trips therefore M/Way, or occasionally the destination chargers in a public car park at Swanage, at 35pKWH. With my previous car I used a rapid at a Lidl store en route, now I can do the entire trip in one go. I have used the Pod Point chargers at Tesco Chesterfield in spite of their limited time , but on my last trip I used the Ionity rapids at the nearby football club.(Time was more important than money , unusually)
My suggestion for supermarkets, and other destinations , is to find a business model that emphasises the convenience of charge as you park and do life.
Yeah this is exactly the issue I've seen with supermarkets. I recently had to go a month using public chargers as my home charger stopped working, surprisingly wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, I had to use a BP Pulse 4 bay hub next to an M&S and Sainsbury's which wasn't cheap but got by.
They really need to reevaluate where they invest in these rapid charge hubs. They should be in supermarkets in areas with a lot of street only parking or destination towns like coastal towns in the south west were large numbers of tourist would need to use them while on holiday.
That said all of this still relies on a big reduction in the cost.
Dave, your thesis is ok if you live in a semi or a detached house with your own garage or parking space, but if you are like me living in a flat several floors above a parade of shops on a main road or in a tower block, a chance to charge while doing the weekly shop, or in a local car park, and in my case need a CHAD-e-MO
Why charge when you pop to the supermarket when you can charge for 7p per KWh at home. My local supermarkets are within the 300 mile round trip range of my car. I used to shop at Tesco even though it was further away than Morrison's, as I had a free top up charge. Now I have to pay to charge, I go to Morrisons instead of Tesco's as it's closer. Incentive to shop at Tesco's has been taken away and I have never had to use the rapid charger at Morrisons.
Why should you get something for free when everyone else pays, typical self righteous EVangelist.
Oh I do feel for you, you buy into this Ev con and then complain.
Free was always a bad idea, the chargers were usually full and they had maybe 4 tops, so not exactly encouraging flood of people into the store.
My local shopping mall gets it right, they have a bank of slow chargers which are generally always full, they are at a reasonable price though, about 35p, and its the sort of mall people go to for several hours.
@@robertedge6326 Everyone loves a bargain. My EV has been the biggest bargain and cost saving I have ever made. Saving me a fortune. 1.4p per mile on Octopus intelligent Go tariff or free with my solar panels and Zappi charger all summer.😂😂😂 Carry on being ripped off for petrol and diesel you fool. 🤡
@@robertedge6326 Because I'm a good citizen and I put my life on the line for the good of the government and country by driving a self combustible...at any moment EV for them. I should get a medal for bravery and free fuel everywhere.
Totally agree. I live in New Malden, the nearest Tesla charger is in Kingston (6 miles away), Sainsbury Cobham is currently installing 12 chargers, Tesco Extra New Malden has one rapid charger & three slow. which see to be frequently used. Merton council is installing 'Lampost chargers' (There's one outside where I live but it doesn't have a marked EV bay 😵💫) Meanwhile the council is dragging its feet on allowing residents to install cable channels across the pavement outside their homes. (Could be a nice little earner for channel iinstallers there)
The only supermarket local to me that has charging is Morrisons and they have a solitary 50kW charger, it was out of order for several months but is now working again, complete with tap-to-pay card reader. I'm told that Sainsburys may be having some installed but no indication as to when. Like most things when it comes to EV charging it seems to be hit and miss geographically.
All of Morrisons chargers seem to be the same. 1 50kw that are hit and miss if they are working. I rarely need a public charger but experience has taught me to avoid Morrisons.
We have a Sainbury's with six chargers and a mile down the road a 24 service station with a small Co-op, Gregg's and Starbucks with a other six chargers.
Hardly ever see anyone using them as it's bang in the middle of three housing estates.......
Unless these become cost effective they’ll never get used. It would be better business for then to lower prices and actually get some money back in doing so!
We only use public chargers as we live in an apartment and our landlord refuses to put a charger in. We either use ESB (46ppkwh) or Monta (23ppkh) both are 22kw chargers. We always use chargers near places we are going to be for a while. Being in Northern Ireland, we don't have many chargers (it's woeful here), but we can still get charging done. However we've not come across many supermarket chargers. I can only think of one, and that was in Belfast (a little far for us in Derry). There are almost no Tesla chargers here either
I can charge at home now but I made use a lot of use of Tesco when it was free. Excellent analysis Dave. Thanks.
I am genuinely surprised that more places don’t offer free slow charging to attract more customers. Nothing expensive, or fancy, Just a simple low amp plug. If I had to choose between 2 identical stores, I would always pick the one with the plug.
You can charge in the car park in Leicester Highcross. I went to try it out but they are 3pin so you need a granny charger. Not sure but I think that is approx 3-4 kWh supply so it isn’t costing them a lot.
@@adrianwood2566 2kw.
Free never works. A discounted rate when spend decent amount in store that is good. A 3kW plug is not worth plugin in for a 30 minute shop, the only people that will use it are those that will abuse it and spend many hours at them (when they even could charge at home). Free is a terrible idea.
That costs them money and then once everywhere has them what advantage would they get?
@@johnbaker5533 I don’t know. I’ve used free chargers while shopping before, I found it convenient to get a few miles added back.
I was one of the 70% who could charge at home, but my EV had realistically only 90 miles of range, so when I had that, I was always looking out for a place to at least slow charge for free or cheap. The range of the car dictates whether you need to public charge as well as whether you have a drive, it might be a fairly medium distance or a few trips on the same day that force a public charge.
I was in the summer at our local Lidl and saw a couple of managers walking round pointing at different things and said to them about the new chargers they had and I said if you were to make them cheaper for someone who did a big shop and could get a discounted top up and they said it sounded interesting and the might bring it up at a meeting. I wonder if they did??
Tesco, Sainsbury's etc all have membership cards. Why not provide a deal of spend e.g. £25 in-store and get a charging rate that is close to home charging (e.g. 4 p more so that you don't have the 70% with home charging clogging up spaces).
Alternatively, provide the offer above in addition to a cheap monthly membership that provides cheap charging.
Then fit 22 kW AC chargers at all parking spots in addition to 5 to 10 350 kW chargers for those on the go. 22 kW because most aren't charging from 0% to full and they tend to visit the store regularly. Government should mandate all cars to come with minimum of 22 kW AC charging and AC charging port on both sides of the car. DC charging can be on one side of the car.
Repeat at all places with parking spots.
Only discovered your channel last week. I really appreciate your perspective Dave - realistic and helpful. I find supermarkets awful. Morrisons where I work had 2 rapid Genie point chargers, neither of which worked for 18 months. They might still not, I stopped even looking a year ago. Sainsbury's has 10 fast chargers - which don't work 90% of the time and are usually blocked by staff parking their cars. Our big Tesco has one rapid and 4 fast chargers - all Podpoint. The rapid charger has been out of order for 6 months and didn't work for much of the previous year. The fast chargers are blocked by taxis charging most of the day and evening. So my experience of empty chargers is because they don't work!
Btw I don't have home charging, and many people in my area of London simply can't either. We do have around 80 on street chargers in our borough which is good. I am in year 5 of an EV - still love it despite the inconvenience of public charging and the massive increase in charging costs
Our local Morrison has a single 50kW charger that was also out of order for months. They have now upgraded it to take tap-to-pay card payments, and it is working again. This was presumably done to comply with the Public Charge Point Regulations.
I have used a Sainsburys rapid charger in Bishop Auckland as it’s convenient for the Locomotion railway museum. The cafe in the store has been closed though.
My local council has partnered with suppliers and has been installing AC22KW chargers at roadside bays. As far as I can see these are 45p per KWH.
M&S are partnered with BP Pulse. Big stores get 50Kw dispensers .. the small select stores in BP Fuel stations get 150Kw dispensers. Works well for me at 57p
Our local Supermarket is Fred Meyer (in Oregon), and we buy all our petrol there as they give a discount up to $1 a gallon for buying groceries at the store. But now we have an EV for 90% of our driving and rarely have to fill our remaining gas vehicle.
They did have a couple of Lvl 2 chargers (7.6kW), but both have been vandalized months ago and not fixed.
_IF_ they had working chargers, and they worked out cheaper than charging at home (2 miles away) with a discount for being a customer, we'd use them. But they don't.
There are some chargers at another Feed Meyer further away, but they charge 5x what we pay at home, so no reason to use them.
I was deliberately shopping from Tesco's when they were offering free charging of 7kw. I probably stayed longer or at least take it easy in the supermarket which was most likely increasing my shopping totals. I no longer go to Tesco's, because there is a Lidl closer. I don't think I am the only one.
A lot depends on what they think the catchment area of the supermarket is. There are several areas of Bristol that have lots of terraced roads and so little off street parking. Bedminster, Southville, Totterdown etc. Supermarkets serving these areas probably would benefit from having chargers on site.
I will always pay cash, to an attractive chatty person, at the supermarket and petrol station checkouts. I will never pay a machine with a card.
Great video, dave. i think sainsburys are expensive. However, they allow you to add cost to the nectar card, so in a roundabout way, you can get a bit off your local shopping, i guess.
Any supermarket that doesn't supply EV charging is missing a major trick. However placing them close by the shop entrance is a major mistake, as lazy idle ICE drivers park their cars in the bays. The only two times I tried to charge at Aldi in Buxton I was not able to find a EV charger. Out of 5 or 6 there was only one EV parked by a charger and even that wasn't plugged in :-(
Totally agree happens everyday at my local Aldi.
Let their tyres down.
@@rogerphelps9939 Then they are there for even longer.
Go into the store customer service desk and tell them that car with registration number parked in the EV bays but not charging appears to have been damaged by somebody …………..
Did you miss the bit where it was explained that it's not the supermarket's decision ?
Some supermarket chargers near me, in Chicago, have free charging. The chargers are slow and always busy. Unless you’re shopping, they are a big waste of time.
My local Tesco’s still use 7kw pod point chargers, and have a 3 hour limit on the car park, very rare you see anyone charging there these days.
Tesco has moved to max 15 mins at night when they shut. It's to stop car meets / cars racing etc and it's working. ANPR fine if stay
I use Tesco for the Pod point charger, it has very nice parking spaces, close to the store and generous space, yes costs about £1 in charging, or free if you just take 5 mins, yes I am a man and I rapid shop.
I was speaking to someone in a car dealership and he is going to Costco to save 7- 10p/litre on fuel. I was surprised because he is 25miles away but I assume when he is in town. However, I drive 3 miles to use Tesla at 41p
The main places we need more chargers are at Motorway service stations. Its as simple as that.
5p/kWh with Tomato Energy between midnight and 6am. We've had our Kona for 6 weeks and have only ever charged at home.
When charging at my local Tesco was free, I used to plug in and pop in store several times a week, never had to use my home charger. I probably spent a fortune in Tesco. Since free charging ended, I go to Tesco less than once a month, for things I can’t get in Aldi.
i went to tesco and could not get on chargers when free. now I have been past or to Tesco and almost all are empty. even at 44p for 7kw. can in some places be more expensive than other charges. I would say Scotland were you can pay as little as 30p for a 7kw or 37p for a 50kw. so why pay 44p or more
Bristol also has 3 Tesla open to all locations
I don’t own a drive way and use public chargers. If the charge is cheaper then I would use a slower charger depending on the shop. I love type 2 if it’s cheaper. Unless I’m not there long enough.
At my local Waitrose, where they have Shell chargers, I rarely see anyone using them.
I don’t think you have it quite right Dave. The cost of installing ultra-rapid chargers is enormous. Nobody is going to be charging 40p while they still have huge upfront costs to recoup and much higher standing charges from the DNO, not to mention the obvious 20% VAT that the government will never give up, as they know the switch to electric will make a huge dent in their fuel duty income. If anything the government will try to find a way to charge 20% vat on home charging.
What is needed is a proper plan. A small number of rapid chargers that are accessible without going in the main car park and multiple 50kW chargers for customers who are shopping at a reduced price.
Wait until more and more vans become electric, especially the large fleet ones. Most of the lads at my place use supermarket or retail charging, as they get to shop /grab lunch while charging.
The chargers in our local Sainsburys are always busy, they are still free 7kW podpoint, no idea when /if they will replace them with rapids.
I went to have a look at a couple of chargers in a car park near where I go quite frequently. What surprised me was that you have to pay the parking fee while you are charging. Is this common? I would have thought that parking would be free while you are charging.
Quite a lot of council car parks have chargers, and it seems quite common that you still must pay the normal parking fees.
@@paulweston1106 Ah - I didn't know that. It seems a little unfair, really.
We visit Bradley Stoke on a regular basis but charge at Cribs Causeway and do our shopping there at the same time, never used the BS site, no point in stopping twice, I guess if the price for charging was in the 40 pence range then maybe we would as we have to go right past it to get where we are going.
Agreed I would travel to a cheaper filling station especially if it also gave me extra points. For this I had to make a special trip that took 20 minutes from home. Thankfully with home charging I can top up my EV whilst I sleep and do so at just 7p.
If supermarkets did give 30p per kWh I would definitely use them on longer journeys. As it is they are too expensive. Again for those with no off road charging available may use it, but again it needs to be cheaper for them.
So true, I think most forms of public EV charging is crazy overpriced when compared to Petrol/Diesel... Rapid charging should not be any more expensive than ICE fuel, and the slower charging types incrementally cheaper... it needs more regulation in terms of what companies can charge, my local train station charges 80p pkw (equal to £2.40 a litre) for a 7kw charging speed, ridiculous pricing, there are 10 charging points that are never used, I contacted the company and they said they're looking into it... they must love not making any money!
I think supermarkets are thinking beyond parking EVs and supermarkets. It makes no sense to allocate so much land for parking when goods sales & delivery will be automated to much higher levels, and land remains a premium for people to live on.
Ah, the halcyon days of 2019 when I used to get a free rapid charge at lidl.
They need to go back to a similar idea where AC charging is a loss leader. About 5p per kWh sounds about right, that would increase footfall to the shops . No point in getting the cable out of the boot otherwise.
What gets me is most supermarkets have acres of roofs yet very little if any solar the 2 well known supermarkets in my area have none. As for supermarkets having cheaper fuel my local independent undercuts supermarkets as the supermarkets are ripping off the public.
Some hotels offer free charging, why don’t supermarkets? Or at most charge 10p a unit
There would be not much point putting chargers in at Sainsbury’s Bamber Bridge store now that the supercharger is open at Walton Summit
The supermarkets don't have a 2 hour limit at 4am.... A lot of supermarkets now have the ANPR cameras and "outside store hours" the time limit is only 15 minutes :)
Charging would have to be 40p per kWh to compete with an average diesel car.
70 kW usable battery x 40p = £28.00.
A realistic range of 250 miles would return 11.2p per mile.
If the supermarket isn't open 24hrs then they aren't going to do any business by opening the car park overnight. Supermarkets probably don't really want cars on their car park when they're closed because of antisocial behaviour and the risk that it just becomes overnight parking. They could try to limit access to just the chargers, but a lot of car parks just have an ANPR reader at the entrance that records cars in and out but not where they park. If the supermarket or at least the landowner is leasing out the charging bays and generating an income from it, then are they even that bothered about whether or not they get used (some lease deals are flat rate, others include an element of profit share). Are the likes of Sainsbury really operating their own chargers or are they still leasing out the spaces and just co-branding with a CPO.
Yeah it would be a hassle offering parking/charging overnight for free for them. Antisocial behaviour, no benefit (sales) to them, etc as you say.
I believe Sainsburys really do have they own CPO. Also Asda and Morrisons have partnerships with MFG (EV power) and EG (ev point/on the move).
Our local Tesco is on a large retail park and have 6 EV chargers, which cost 44p per kw. Sounds good but there are a couple of problems with them though, which may be why they are rarely used. Firstly they are 7kw chargers and the maximum stay in the retail park where they are situated is 3 hours, but only the first 2 hours are free, you have to pay for the extra hour. There are many reports on the car park website (Not owned or run by Tesco) of people who did not realise that the third hour was payable until they found a parking ticket for £60. Secondly the retail park is locked from 22.00 until 7.00 so you could not leave your car there overnight, even if you wanted to.
No wonder the charging infrastructure in this country is so poor.
Dave, this is your best video yet. Damn good analysis.
BTW I don't understand why Hotels and B&Bs aren't falling over themselves to install fast chargers, that could be used overnight. SOme do, but often the hotel itself is more expensive than the competition: in which case I'll stay in the cheaper hotel and then charge at the Tesco Pod Point.
I'm the same, I don't choose a £200 per night hotel just to get free charging. If it's just an overnight on a road trip, I can get something plenty nice enough for half that and use a different charger enroute.
Similar to the supermarkets they have often sold the rights to manage their car parks and use fines as a revenue stream. So many contradictory pressures.
Local Morrisons has a 2 cable CCS dispenser asking 79p/kW, down the road is a Premier Inn asking the same for using their 4 x 50kW charger cables. Round the corner from Morrusons and directly across the road is a CPS charge hub wanting 55p.kW on the 50kW/22kwAC combo chargers and 30p/kW on the slow 7kW posts. The land owner at Morrusons and Premier must be wondering why there are NEVER any EVs using their facilities. Needless to say I don’t use any of the chargers as we have even cheaper 7kW charging in our village but I have home charging and a car that does 135 miles on a 60% charged battery. Even the CPS chargers in town are rarely all in use - there are 5 x 50kW and 10 x 7kW, in 2021 when I bought my 1st EV I never charged at home because the chargers in town were all free to use if you didn’t mind waiting in the queue.
I don't even bother to go to the supermarket, just do it online, lot less hassle. Charge EV at home with occasional away charging at Tesla open to all sites.
I think they missed the point, obviously they just want to maintain the status quo set yesteryear I imagine there are economic interests wanting to maintain things as they are. We charge at home to avoid being ripped off by the likes of Gridserve, Instavolt or Applegreen.
On a happier note, I downloaded the latest Tesla update, V12.2024.44.3.1, now I get offered a range of parking spots, I pressed the spot I fancied (bit of a tight squeeze to get into) and lo and behold the car nipped into the spot like it was on greased tracks ! Well impressed.
Cost of this update, nowt !
I go on approximately a 22 mile round trip to use a Tesla Charger at 39p per KHW rather than 1 mile to the local supermarket charge at much greater cost.
You don't value your time very highly then.
@rogerphelps9939 I get paid for the journey. It's a company car and for work mileage. They refused to give me a electric car fuel card.
Didn’t you do a video a few months ago where you said competition between supermarkets would mean a price war on charging, leading to lower costs?
Certainly did, certainly do still believe it will happen. Progress can sometimes be really slow
I don't think you can have a price war when you're selling a product to people who don't care about the cost because it's almost a one-off.
It's like bottled water, you buy it when you are thirsty and far from home. Cost is secondary.
@ If it’s any consolation - supermarkets seem less competitive for petrol and diesel for at least the last year.
@ . But this is the problem - you’re basing it the present owners -who can charge at home. There’s a whole part of the community that can’t - until this is addressed, EV’s will never go above 50% adoption.
What about saying how much pre-authorisation each company require?
Sainsbury’s are very dear
Far too expensive
There are also council car chargers are they getting it right?
Sainsbury’s Glasgow chargers always empty
Maybe drop the price to 45p/kWh (cheaper with a monthly subscription, eg 30p/kWh) and they should attract customers without home charging, and also holiday makers, and anyone on a trip to relatives etc, who need a topup...including those with home charging? Nectar points?
More and more people will need a public charger. Most of the early adopters can charge at home. 40-50% of people in the UK can't charge at home apparently because they have no parking lot at their home.
That’s a made up figure I’m afraid. The official government data says can already charge at home 65% cannot at present charge at home 35% but about 5% have access to workplace charging so don’t need home charging and 10% could charge at home with pavement gullies or overhead cables or similar technologies. Only around 10-15% will end up totally excluded.
@@davetakesiton"off road parking" is not the same as parking on the drive and neither automatically Mac that a charge point can be installed.
The figure will be much less than the oft trotted out figure of people that can charge at home.
Although these chargers are far from perfect, At least we have somewhere to charge our cars.
Tesco used to have free charging with PodPoint which was great. Not free anymore. One of the reasons I no longer have an EV.
I assume you don’t drive a petrol car because the petrol is not free either
@davetakesiton I do indeed drive a petrol car. It is much cheaper to buy in the first place and has 4 times the range of the EV I had which means it can be our only car.
When my EV was written off I considered getting a new one as they seemed cheaper to run. But the prices off them were going up and up, electric charging prices too, now road tax... I don't see the incentive anymore.
The majority of the UK housing stock is terraced housing, so they won't be really able to charge at home so that percentage will increase for usage so this could be what supermarkets are waiting for
Wow! Why so negative? No, the truth is quite the opposite. The majority of housing is not terraced. Many now have workplace charging so do not need to charge at home. Some terraced do have off street parking., some even have garages. My local council has just approved pavement gullies and announced a massive installation programme of lamp post chargers for the rest who can’t charge at home.
The highest figure I have seen for homes without off-road parking is 45%, the typical figure quoted is around 30%, still high but not the majority you suggest. There are around 20% of homes where there is no car ownership, and I suspect there will be a significant crossover between homes without cars and homes without parking.
@@davetakesiton The gullies are a good start and I think the Government should step in and take the decision about installing these out of the hands of local councils so that they are automatically approved. Even these are not a perfect solution as they still require you to be able to get into the space outside your house and, as anyone who has ever lived in in one of these types of houses will know parking is first come first served and getting the space outside your own house is hit and miss.
Gullies are also useless on those estates where there is no road in front of the house, there are lots of council estates that were built like this in the 60's and early 70's. We still need to progress the affordable and convenient charging solutions.
Just like petrol - who cares! As long as the charger works I don’t care who it belongs to. Price is another issue as you say. If I’m buying whilst “on the road” I will choose the cheapest. Today this is Tesla.
I normally charge at work, (a warehouse) and it is free (7 kw max - bring your own lead). If the supermarkets put in free 7 kw units in large numbers they would attract lots of people they do not get at present. This was the main reason for the petrol pump stations. I doubt it would cost supermarkets very much, and surely they pay much less for their own power.... I bet they make a lot more overall profit per visit.... Fossil Fuel Fanatics might see the light...
Supermarkets pay more for their power than domestic houses. They are not capped the same way like domestic supply (what is that about 25p atm). I'm not sure free could ever work for them or should it be free.
People will not bother for a 30 minute for doing actual shopping and will abuse it any stay for hours and walk away even if they could charge at home. Why should they give away tens of pounds for very little return?
Supermarkets are one of the best places to install a combination of rapid and slower chargers. This way they can attract both EV drivers who can't charge at home and those that can. Those that can't charge at home can use the rapid chargers to give themselves a pretty much complete top up while they shop. Those who can charge at home would be tempted in with free or very cheap slow charging. The Government should be making legislation to drive this and supporting Supermarkets in getting the installations in. Most importantly the price per kWh needs to enable charging at a cheaper than petrol or diesel equivalent price. As Supermarkets often have large outdoor car parks they'd also be well suited to solar canopies and storage battery installations too. This would help where grid connections wouldn't normally be able to support multiple rapid chargers and give Supermarkets another revenue stream.
Free charging is no revenue stream for them. Why should they give away about £3 an hour (7kW chargers at business electricity rates @ 40-50p per kW) for electricity for nothing?
@johnbaker5533 I guess you haven't worked in retail or know what a loss leader is. I remember the baked bean price wars in the 90's. All to get people in the door and increase revenue.
@@leegoodman297 of course I understand loss leaders. But it to work people you have to get people through the doors. Buying a max of 4 tins of beans and losing a few pence on each one is understandable as you are entering the store and will likely buy something else.
They could offer a voucher for reduced charging a slow chargers maybe even free for an hour if you spend £50 or something.
Previously the free charging was so abused people would plug in all day and not shop there.
@johnbaker5533 I had a similar scheme to getting free parking when you shop in mind for the free charging. Number plate recognition technology or signing into an app would enable an EV driver to start charging and once they'd shopped and given in their registration plate or scanned an app QR code the charging session would be discounted or free depending on the amount spent in store. That way the Supermarket doesn't lose out in any scenario and customers would get a free or discounted charging session.
@@leegoodman297 Yeah I'm fine with solutions like that. They are sensible solutions that suit both sides. We need that instead of the "it should be free" camp of (entitled) people.
Spending £50 for a 30 minute charger can be free.
Spending just 80p on a Mars bar for 3 hours free will not be.
Id drive past 3 petrol stations to save a penny per litre, you bet il drive an extea 10 miles to use a tesla chargingstation.
Out of pure principle alone.
That's nuts mate. Life's too short for that kind of nonsense 😂😂😂
You'll save more by just buying a cheaper pint... honestly 🎉
Given Musk's shenanagins I will not use a Tesla charger out of principle.
@@rogerphelps9939curious, which shenanigans are bad enough to make you say that?
What has musk done to you?
@@StephenButlerOne Right? This person is voluntarily paying 50% extra for fuel, for what? I genuinely don't understand why people hate Elon so much, I'd love to be informed
The people who have currently got EVs are early adopters, these people are almost certainly relatively well off and have their own drives and can charge at home. As the market develops more and more people will eventually purchase second or third or more hand electric cars and they will frequently have less access to EV charging at home. My guess is half the places people live in the UK are not well geared up for home charging. Those are the people who will benefit from supermarket charging. Not the early adopters. It only will require one supermarket chain not be run by a moron and they will show the way for EV charging, and the others will then have to fall into line. One other thought. People make money by purchasing something say electricity for 8p per unit and selling it for more. If I had a home charger and I only used it one night per week on the other 6, I could let others use it. If I charged 30p per unit I would be making 22p per unit for not doing much say £15 per night x 6 I could in theory be making £90 per week for letting them charge at my house. I think this is a possibility which would for some people solve their charging issues / costs. In some parts of the country people already rent out their drives for parking. - Just a thought.
There are apps for just that. Only issue is finding somewhere to put your car when your space is being used. 😊
I like the channel but get to the point. Or change the name to Dave waffles on
IMO most people are not as interested in charging cost as you Dave. I really don't think many care or pay much attention to the price of fuel for their car, or charge for their EV. These chargers must be making money for the operators otherwise they would surely just remove them?
Agree. I use them so seldom that the cost is completely irrelevant. Good coffee is far more important
I think that you have missed the point about charging when travelling. I don't want to charge at motorway services when I'm on the road because they are expensive and unpleasant places. I would much rather pull a couple of miles off the main road/motorway and charge at a garden centre, farm shop, supermarket or shopping centre. As I do 95% of my charging at home I'm not that price-sensitive when on the road but I still won't pay more than 79p of course. This leaves me plenty of choice for pleasant places to charge.
I've used Smart Charge (Sainsburys) several times on the road and have been very happy with the overall service - the supermarket food cost saving more than offsets the 75p (not 79p) premium price so you have to look at the big picture. Sainsbury are already offering Nectar points on charging so I'm expecting that their business model will evolve over time probably directed at drivers who cannot charge at home.
Like you in excess of 95% of my miles come from home charging, unlike you I will charge at motorway services for convenience. This type of charging accounts for so little of my mileage that the high price isn't significant in the overall picture and I going to be stopping for the toilet anyway. I also accept that I will be paying over the odds for the food and drink at the services but again it is so infrequent it just isn't an issue. I rarely used the filling station at services but if I was on an exceptionally long journey that required refuelling, I would pay service station prices.
My guess is that a lot of people use motorway services chargers because they know that they are likely to be working and that they are convenient.
Free in general is poor as it encourages bad practices. Even those that can charge at home would hog chargers for hours when they didn't need to just to say a quid.
Free slow charging at the supermarket was a nightmare people would stay as long as possible, go walk around town do other things or not bother at all as a 20-30 minute stop at a slow charger while shopping is barely worth it for the extra time it takes to get your cable out and plug in.
Rapid Supermarket charger is too expansive but often locally people without home charging have limited options. Sure they might be one 10 miles out of the way to charge but a supermarket is somewhere you likely need to visit any and a rapid would make sense once a week to fill up while you shop for 30 minutes.
If it is slightly more expensive even I can see people using them once more people who cannot charge at home buy in larger numbers.
Tesco's are open 24 7 365 days a year, the conservative government told Tesco's that many people would be buying electric cars, by law
The stores should put in 50KW chargers at 50p. Then, let you earn free minutes with your purchases. People would plug in for free. They may even pay a little if they overstay their free minutes. But use the cheap chargers to attract flat dwellers to the store. And give free minutes to get homeowners to use their chargers.
Some innovative ideas will spring forth it will be interesting to see which
Tesco chargers by me are rammed every day, even the more expensive fastchargers.
Hi I am interested in a tesla model 3 2021 on a 71 plate it has wooden trims inside how can you tell which type of battery it lfp etc.
By asking the seller?
The recent standard range Model 3s have LFP batteries. I’m not sure if it applies to all. Another aoption is to ask the question on the Tesla Motors Club forum.
If 70% of EV drivers charge at home, that means 30% have to. It also means some of the 70% charge at public chargers. EG business users with Tesla etc probably don't charge at home because a) it is a pain to do the expenses and B) it is paid via the company so they don't care.
So I'd say about 50% of people use public chargers. I use Tesla at 41p for my E-Nero @Tesla Glasgow but I then go to the nearest supermarket for stuff. I have used Tesco in some locations (Elgin) because it was 50p and had breakfast. I would NEVER use a supermarket charger unless it is good value. If they made it good value I would go there and buy my shopping. I don't want something for nothing. I would even pay a £10 EV subscription. I did this on IONITY to bring the price down from 74p to 43p and used that all the time before Tesla Glasgow opened p to non Tesla.
I think most people would be surprised how many viewers tell me they never ever charge at public chargers. While I tend to agree with you, most drivers will only charge at a public charger once or twice a year
@@davetakesiton I live in a flat in Glasgow. I should have said 30% have to use public chargers all the time. I can't charge at home so we have to use public chargers. I sometimes use them 3x a week.
So if I'm on a long journey then go to a supermarket to recharge cause it'll almost certainly be empty? Haha
Why should those of us who have ice cars subsidise you EV owners when it comes to charging your overpriced cars at supermarkets?
I agree, but offering discounts in the same way that some supermarkets do on fuel if you have a loyalty card and spend over a certain amount on your shop doesn't seem unreasonable. Supermarkets could also offer it as something of a loss leader if they thought they could profit elsewhere from it, again something that happens anyway.
Why subsidise? How much do you think supermarkets pay for electricity?
for me ...Tesla just needs to change all the charger to V4 that way none Tesla cars can charge easily with the cables
They're fine as they are, other chargers are available if they don't work well for you. 😉
@@djtaylorutube I only use Tesla chargers. And if a space for nine cars is taken up by three because they're wrongly packed it's infuriating for other users. So it's not fine as they are they need to change the charging system so that everyone can have a chance for charging.
@issiewizzie or the wrong siders could go elsewhere or be blocked entirely until they lobby their manufacturer to put the port on the correct side. Or Our Lord Elon could just close access again. 😉