Marty McFly and Doc Brown must have felt like this when they got into the DeLorean for the first time and started the Flux Capacitor that would take them back from 1985 to 1955. But on this grey Friday afternoon, it is two 1.90-metre men of at least two quintals (200kg) who squeeze into a pretty Lotus Elise, to beam themselves a few years into the future. Rainer and I are trying out the TESLA Roadster. At this point, we don’t want to spend much time talking about the car. This is because it is thoroughly described on the web. And we only take it for a short drive in the afternoon traffic from the TESLA shop on Blumenstrasse in Munich down to Isar and Widenmeyerstrasse and back (of course, not without a short stop in Maximilianstrasse to look for Porsche). A few times we are in pole position at a red light and break away, reaching 100km/h in less than four seconds (shh, don’t tell anyone…). Only one word can describe the acceleration, the chassis and the driving pleasure: Incredible!

Those who would like to try it themselves can contact the friendly people around Craig Davis at the TESLA shop in Munich and arrange a test drive. But we also recommend visiting this shop to all those who would like to know how cars are sold in the third millennium. It is astonishingly simple. Take three things: An awesome product. A good story. A website. With this simple recipe, TESLA has sold more than 2,000 cars. No, we’re not talking about the snazzy roadster, which costs around €100,000, owing to its expensive carbon construction, thus limiting it to a few hundred cars worldwide. It is the Model S sedans that are going like hotcakes. So much so, this car won’t be delivered to its proud owners for two years, at the earliest. There isn’t even a factory for it yet.

Future owners pay €4,000 for the basic model or €30,000 for one of the first 1,000 fully equipped “Signature Models”. The final price? Sorry, it’s not yet available in Euros. But in the USA the basic car will (presumably) cost US$57,500 of which US$7,500 will be subsidised by the American government (we also won’t comment on the features of the Model S, which does an impression of a Maserati Quattroporte; TESLA chief designer Franz von Holzhausen will be showing the car on YouTube).

It is not surprising that a company whose CEO is the founder of PayPal (and who builds rockets on the side with the company SpaceX on behalf of NASA), believes in the Internet as a communication medium. Nevertheless the amount of marketing materials that accompany the TESLA web presence is astounding: None. It is only because there are still a few promotional sheets, each about half the size of a postcard, left over from the last IAA that there is anything resembling a brochure in the TESLA shop.

Original dialogue: “Can we have one of the preliminary contracts to order the Model S?” – “Sure, here is the Mac, you can register right away. Then transfer 4,000 Euros and you will be issued a serial number. The car will be here in 2012 and until then you are a part of the TESLA community and will be informed of the progress made just as quickly as the employees. If at some point you aren’t interested in the car anymore, you can get your money back up to three months prior to delivery.”