Why is the Leaf so expensive – Nissan Responds
June 2, 2012
By 
I had quite a long phone conversation with a Nissan Customer Support staff member regarding the cost differential mentioned in our earlier blogs about the Leaf. I was also sent an email outlining Nissan Australia’s reasoning for the differnce in the US v Australia pricing – to quote from Nissan:
“…We strongly believe that the pricing of the Nissan LEAF reflects the value of the vehicle in this country considering the state of the art technology and innovations it represents.
When comparing to the US market, please be aware that there are two model levels of the Nissan LEAF available. One which is an entry level model and the 2nd a premium model. We have elected to only sell the premium model in Australia, as we believe this reflects the needs and wants of our customers.
Additionally, when Nissan reviews the price of any vehicle we take a number of factors into account. These vary greatly from country to country and include but are not limited to, government charges and taxes, cost of aftersales support and infrastructure costs associated with introducing and supporting a new vehicle model.
Like you, we at Nissan are disappointed with the absence of any government incentives for early adopters of EV’s and we continue to campaign to change this mindset. We encourage you to utilise your own resources to campaign both Federal and State governments to help change their policy positions on incentives for EV purchasers.
We stand by the fact this is a premium vehicle which is innovative and contains state of the art technology. As a result this will be reflected in the purchase price.”
So – any comments readers?
Leo :)