About 1 in 5 Model S cars coming off the Tesla assembly line headed to Europe last year. They're not starting from nothing; the Model S was the best-selling car of any make in Norway, and has sold at least hundreds of units into 6 European countries. Small numbers compared to the incumbents, but certainly high enough to matter to Tesla which only sells some thousands of cars each quarter.

I was just curious about whether Tesla have achieved something that has failed other US manufacturers - create a car that appeals in the US home market and in Europe.

Tesla lack the traditional ugliness and fuel inefficiency of US cars; the model S looks like a Jaguar but is cheap to run. Nor is it too large.

I was trying to be diplomatic about why I thought US car models hadn't traditional done well in Europe.... :-)

"traditional" US cars - so massive SUVs and trucks with 7.0L V8 engines are not popular because of their sheer size(a car which is "normal" by US standards, like Dodge Ram, can barely fit on an average UK street), fuel economy and insurance - people buy cars with tiny engines like 1.2/1.6L partially because they are more efficient,but also because owning a car with a >2.0L engine would make your insurance and road tax huge(and I am saying that as a person who used to own a 4.4L V8 car in the UK).

A Dodge Ram is not a "normal" sized car even in the U.S., and will be quite out of place in say Philadelphia.

Rams are the fifth best selling passenger vehicle in the US. http://www.autoblog.com/2014/01/06/top-10-best-selling-vehic... . As the owner of one, I do agree it can be hard to park.

I know a bunch of people who drive Ford F-150's as their primary vehicle, including commuting and just driving around on weekends.

M62 engine FTW!

You mean like the Ford Focus, which sells more units in Europe every year than Tesla has made, ever?

C'mon. Tesla was the "best selling car" due to delivering years worth of orders all in the 2nd half of last year, and topped the sales figures only if you aggregate them by model rather than make. Even in the months where the S was the top selling model, Ford sold more cars in Norway than Tesla.

I get the feeling it's doing fine in Denmark as well. Seeing them more and more each day.

Haven't seen any around Århus but I'll keep an eye out.

Aarhus* :P

I was going to suggest the Ford Focus, but it turns out that Ford actually launched that in Europe before the US.

I remember how on my first visit to the US one of the things that surprised me most was how different car models were from the ones in Europe, I couldn't recognize a single one (not to mention the monster sized SUV and trucks that I never saw before).

I believe the difference in distances, city planning and fuel price play quite a role in consumer preference on the two sides of the ocean.

The first global car like that was the Model T http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Model_T#First_global_car

The last time I was there, I saw a fair number of Jeeps. Wranglers and Grand Cherokees.

Jeep was actually my own guess as to the only US manufacturer to sell cars in any volume and they don't exactly sell very many... (e.g. in the UK in 2012 there were three times as many Porsche's sold as Jeeps).

Where does this strange meme arise that US car companies don't sell cars in Europe. Jeep the "only US manufacturer to sell cars in any volume" what? Ford and GM collectively control about 15% of the European car market.

For perspective, Kia sells TWENTY TIMES more cars in Europe than does Jeep. Kia's market share is ~2%.