Enlarge (credit: Richard Newstead/Getty Images)

Electric vehicle sales had a pretty good 2023 in North America, with more than 1.1 million battery EVs and just under 300,000 plug-in hybrid EVs finding new homes. That's a 50 percent increase on 2022, yet the last few months have seen the trade and business presses report a string of negative stories about EV adoption. And it's not just news stories—major automakers are scaling back their EV ambitions, and together with auto dealerships, they're lobbying the White House to water down its plan to reduce transportation-related carbon emissions.

While US car buyers are still choosing EVs in greater numbers, the rate of increase is beginning to slow . According to a report from S&P Global, EV registrations grew by 23 percent in December, faster than the general increase in new light vehicle sales (15 percent year over year). But market leaders did not do so well. Tesla only grew sales by 11 percent; at Ford, they rose by 13 percent. Chevrolet saw EV sales drop by 26 percent as it finally exhausted its supply of the low-cost Bolt EV.

Car buyers’ concerns

Similarly, a survey from Deloitte provides a little more pessimism when it comes to EV adoption. It has found that only 6 percent of buyers are now considering a battery EV, down from 7 percent in 2023. Demand for plug-in hybrids has also fallen, from 7 percent in 2023 to 5 percent in 2024. Instead, more buyers want gasoline- or diesel-powered vehicles, a full two-thirds in 2024 compared to 58 percent last year.

Enlarge / Ford Motor Company President and CEO Jim Farley at the launch event for the Ford F-150 Lightning at the Rouge Electric Vehicle Center in Dearborn, Michigan, on Tuesday, April 26, 2022.

Ford dealers have until the end of October to decide if they want to keep selling electric vehicles. And they'll have to agree to some new conditions if they do, including transparent, set pricing, available online, according to a new report at Inside EVs .

We've known for some time that Ford was looking to shake up the way people buy its EVs in the US, moving all its EVs into a new business unit called Model e, with another called Ford Blue that will be responsible for internal combustion vehicles and hybrids. In June, CEO Jim Farley said : "We've got to go non-negotiated price. We've got to go 100 percent online. There's no inventory, it all goes directly to the customer. And 100 percent remote pickup and delivery," during a presentation to investors.

Farley's not going to get all those wishes, but this week the automaker gave dealers a look at the future during an annual dealer conference. If a dealer wants to sell Model e EVs, they'll have to agree to invest in regular training, install charging infrastructure, improve their physical and digital sales experiences, and perhaps most importantly, publish non-negotiable pricing online. You should be able to buy a Ford EV without ever setting foot in a dealership, but due to state laws the sales will continue to be facilitated through dealerships, not directly from Ford.

Enlarge / Ford's electric F-150 Lighting (L), eTransit (M), and Mustang Mach-E (R) battery-electric vehicles have all been such successes that they're all sold out for the rest of the year. And that's prompting the company to rethink how it goes about the whole process. (credit: Ford)

Few Americans enjoyed the car-buying process even before supply chain chaos, and the chip shortage led dealerships to mark up inventory by thousands of dollars . But buying a Ford electric vehicle might be a lot less painful in the future, if Ford CEO Jim Farley gets his way. On Wednesday, Farley said that he wants the company's EVs to be sold online-only, with no dealer markups or other price negotiations, according to the Detroit Free Press .

"We've got to go to non-negotiated price. We've got to go to 100 percent online. There's no inventory (at dealerships), it goes directly to the customer. And 100 percent remote pickup and delivery," Farley said while speaking at a conference in New York.

One of Tesla's most popular innovations was to eschew traditional dealerships and sell its products directly to customers. But traditional manufacturers like Ford are usually prohibited from selling their products directly to customers , a legacy of fears over vertical integration written into state laws during the early 20th century. As such, Ford's franchised dealers will almost certainly still have a role to play.