Why do electric cars have to LOOK like electric cars?

[samj2014]

This is a bit of a rant really, and I probably know the answer already, but hey ho.

Anyway, I was browsing electric cars yesterday, because I'm hopefully going to be in a decent job soon and I like the idea of owning an electric car (as well as something fun), as I'll probably have a bit of a commute. So I'm wondering what choice there is in terms of reasonably sized electric cars, turns out you can have either a focus, a golf, or a leaf. Fair enough, the market isn't huge yet, I get that.

So anyway, I went on their respective 'car configurator' pages to see what the options are like. As a designer, I find this part quite frustrating - car marque websites are awful to navigate, but that's for another rant... So to find the leccy focus, you have to scroll past ALL of the others, and the little avatar sits right next to the Focus RS, but a grand more expensive... So straight away I'm thinking, you know what, fk it, I'd rather have an RS. I selected the leccy car anyway, and then came the frustrating bit.

I wonder what alloys I could have? (I'm looking at both the golf and the focus here) Oh, there's only the one, and they're the ugly-as-sin ones that absolutely scream "I drive something extremely mundane, but I want it to look flash". Great. How about colours? Maybe that'll redeem it somewhat? Ah yes, any colour so long as it's grey. And why must all electric cars have strips of blue LEDs on the front bumper? Why must the whole world know that the car is electric? Why must electric cars look either incredibly boring or ugly? Why can it not just look like a car? You know, like a normal car? I mean, there's nothing inherently 'diesel' looking about any diesel car, so why is electric different? I don't want to drive around in something that screams "look how mundane my car is, but i'm saving the planet because it's electric!".

Tesla seem to be the only people getting it right, in my opinion. It's just a lovely looking car.

Am I just a grumpy sod, or does anyone else agree with me?

[samj2014]

Yeah that actually jumped to mind as I was writing it, it's not an insane price either. Perhaps more manufacturers should take note!

The golf, focus and leaf (the only ones I'd be in any position to buy) look awful though.

[samj2014]

MitchT said:

I've been asking this for a while. If you want to clean up car emissions then you have to get the people who are most likely to be driving dirty vehicles to buy clean ones. Sadly, affordably priced 'eco' cars all look like some toy that a young mumsy woman would give a small child to play with in the bath. Only the BMW i8 and Tesla Model S really look like credible substitutes for the kind of cars that really need to be replaced by cleaner machines, but they're unaffordable for most people. When affordable green cars look sporty, muscular and masculine then we'll start to make some progress. Until then they'll only be bought by people who have beards and wear their sister's jeans.

Glad to know I'm not alone. I'd consider a golf if it came with some decent alloys and colours other than grey... Oh and the stupid blue LEDs.

[samj2014]

Butter Face said:

A Mugen CRZ is what you desire. 197bhp supercharged 1.5.


And to answer the original question (although it's already been said) the Renault ZOE is what you need. Looks relatively normal.

It's a little bit too 'supermini' for me I think. If it was up to me I'd have a Golf or passat estate (or something along those lines)