Invest in L.E. Motors, Inc

The Situation

There is a huge gap in the automotive marketplace right now, which means a huge opportunity. Car and Driver magazines estimates that around 40% of a car's cost to manufacture, and therefore what the consumer is paying for, is electronics, which is up from around 15% in early 2000s.

Today the cheapest midsize SUV "starts" at a price around $30k.

Used car prices have become outrageous as well.

And in 2022, the median household income in the United States was recorded at only around $70k. That means over half of American households cannot afford to buy a new midsize SUV for their families and have to hope that the 7 year old used car with 125k miles on it that they buy for $20k, will survive and not cost them thousands more in repair bills.

The Opportunity

The Solution

L.E. Motors, named after our daughter Ellie, and abbreviated for Less Expensive Motors (credit to my wife on that one), is created to fill that market gap by creating vehicles that go back to the basics of what each type of automobile is meant to be, but with enough features to keep them up to date so that the average person will still be happy with the included amenities. Just a few examples would include power windows and locks, a standard inductive charger for your cell phone, versatile cargo dimensions, and ample built in storage compartments for your basic roadside assistance kit and the other basics that would just be thrown in your trunk and rolling around.

Why I chose to start with crowd funding

This is an easy one. The whole point of L.E. Motors is to produce cars for the people, so it's just natural to start with crowd funding, especially on a platform like Wefunder where the people can invest as little as $100. I personally have invested in 24 different companies on Wefunder, ranging from as little as $100, up to the highest amount of $3,600. And I'm happy to say that only 1 of those companies didn't make it (mostly due to COVID) so I feel like Wefunder is a pretty good platform to attract startups and companies that are likely to be successful.

How I will use the funding

My raise targets in this first round are a minimum of $200k and a maximum of $1.5M.

If we hit the minimum $200k, this should be enough to fund L.E. Motors for 8-10 months, deliver the functional concept vehicle, and begin design for the minimum viable product (MVP):

• Wefunder will take $15k (7.5%)
• $15k in legal fees to set everything up and put make sure all the I's are dotted and T's crossed
• $20k for initial startup and fabrication equipment (computers, software, shop equipment, tools)
• $50k in materials to build a functional concept SUV
• $100k for wages and hiring first team members (myself, fundraising and outreach, and a hands on engineer - already have people ready to join)

If we hit the maximum $1.5M, this should be enough to fund L.E. Motors for 1.5-2 years, deliver the functional concept vehicle, design and build the minimum viable product (MVP), launch a smart marketing campaign, take pre-orders, and begin development of scaleup production:

• Wefunder will take $112.5k (7.5%)
• $15k in legal fees to set everything up and put make sure all the I's are dotted and T's crossed
• $100k for startup and fabrication equipment (computers, software, shop equipment, tools)
• $300k for flex space rent and shop/office buildout
• $50k in materials to build a functional concept SUV
• $200k for MVP design and build
• $100k for consulting/contractor services
• $22.5k for miscellaneous expenses
• $600k for wages and hiring first team members (myself, fundraising/outreach/marketing, a hands on engineer, lead mechanic, and a tenured startup operations professional - already have people ready to join)

Family created this idea

I originally came up with this idea after car shopping for my wife and I when our first born daughter was just a few months away from being due. We put together a list of our needs and wants, and don't wants, and me being the car guy from Vermont whose father owned an automotive repair and tire shop all my life, I got to work looking. And what did I find? I found that generally there was no longer a big distinction between the mainstream brands and their "luxury" partner. For example, what I mean by that is that it used to be that you would buy a Toyota to get a safe, reliable, and practical vehicle to get you from point A to point B, and you could get some upgrades like power windows and locks, automatic transmission, maybe a moonroof, and maybe even cruise control. And then if you wanted to more luxury options, you would just upgrade to a Lexus to get the power and heated seats, leather upholstery, parking sensors and backup camera, etc. And with that, you could spend $20-25k on a brand new rav4, or upgrade and spend $40-50k on a brand new NX300 with all the bells and whistles.

Nowadays, it seems like you can basically get all the same features no matter what brand you choose, but the worst art isn't that you can get all those features, but that you have to, and you have to pay for it. No longer can you buy a safe and reliable, brand new baseline model that has an engine, 4 wheels, and a steering wheel that is really meant to just move people and stuff as originally intended. Now even the baseline model is gong to come equipped with all these extra features and electronics that are "nice to haves" but fall under what I would call "I don't wanna pay for that".

And I will fully admit, when we bought our family SUV, we went with the Kia Sorento, and went with the top of the line model, which cost around $55k. And it is really nice, but the more that I drive it, the more upset I am knowing that it cost that much and most features I don't like using or specifically I very much dislike the way they were implemented.

Then I have been looking for a newer vehicle, specifically a pickup truck, for myself to upgrade from my 2005 Vovlo S40 T5 AWD 6-speed manual (which I do love because it's fun, simple, gets the job done, and I picked it up used with only 107k miles for $3k), and I definitely don't need all the bells and whistles, nor do I need or want it to be brand new, but can't find anything under $20k that is less than 5 years old and less that 100k miles. A 5 year old pickup truck with 80k miles used to be $7,500.

So to sum it up, in my recent car buying experience, I personally feel that the value is just not there for the price anymore, and that is the reason why we need Less Expensive Motors.