The 2025 Chicago Auto Present opened this week, and I’ve been struggling a bit with how one can method this story in regards to the decline and fall of what was as soon as the American auto trade’s premier industrial automobile present – however one factor was completely clear: the Nissan LEAF is one of the best new automotive deal in Chicago. ***
Like every wild deal like this, there are asterisks and caveats. And (I promise) I’ll completely get to these. That mentioned, I’ve some musings in regards to the state of the Chicago Auto Present that I’ve shared, beneath, to kind of “set the stage,” if you’ll. If you wish to skip these, you possibly can can click on right here to get proper to the nitty-grity on that 2025 Nissan LEAF deal, or just click on right here to discover a Nissan LEAF deal close to you.
2025 Chicago Auto Present Map
When you’ve got fond reminiscences of the Chicago Auto Present from years previous – and never even that a few years previous; like, pre-COVID years previous – skip the 2025 present.
As soon as upon a time, the Chicago Auto Present occupied each major halls, with one other corridor housing industrial vehicles and distributors, and drive activations outdoors and within the parking zone. Since that heyday, the present has shrunk considerably. It’s all the way down to a single corridor now. Depressingly, the present can’t even fill that with OEM shows, and has labored numerous distributors, drive occasions of each the EV and ICE-powered varieties, and even navy recruiters into big swaths of flooring house. Regardless of the compacted nature of the shows, the present flooring isn’t packed. It is possible for you to to sit down in any automotive you need, for so long as you need, with minimal likelihood of interruption.
I used to be fortunate sufficient to have the ability to stroll the present with my good buddy and trade legend, Greg Lucia. Greg is finest recognized for an iconic, gonzo PR stunt he pulled off whereas he was working at Toyota that concerned the Area Shuttle Endeavour being towed to its last vacation spot on the California Science Middle in Los Angeles throughout the 405 freeway by a then-new Tundra.
Oddly sufficient, we each honed in on a particular yr, 1997, as one which stood out.
“I had a part-time job at Sears whereas I used to be in faculty,” I advised Greg. “I used to be making $9/hr. plus both 1% or 3% of every part I rang up. It labored out to a reasonably regular $12/hr., and that cash was ok that there have been a bunch of vehicles I might have fairly purchased. I ended up with a ’98 Dodge Dakota pickup. Guide. My fee was $218/mo.”
“These have been neat vehicles,” he mentioned. Including, after a considerate minute, “I don’t assume you would try this, in the present day.”
Greg is clearly appropriate. Auto Exhibits have turned a nook. As an alternative of being someplace that any able-bodied particular person might go and, with an affordable quantity of effort and willingness to place within the hours, select a enjoyable, reliable automobile. In such an financial local weather, it’s no marvel that the automotive you drove mentioned one thing about you above and past what you would afford. In the present day, the closest factor to that mid-sized Dakota might be the present Ford Ranger. The mid-sized Ford begins at $32,820 … however the common part-time mall job doesn’t pay any greater than I made again in ’97. If something, it pays much less.
I puzzled what doable worth a standard auto present might provide a university child in 2025, when one thing like a base Ford Mustang that began at about $15,800 in 1997 has greater than doubled to $31,920 and the price of faculty has risen even larger, over 140% in the identical interim, whereas wages have largely stayed the identical.
Deeply entrenched on this gloomy temper, I plodded alongside between the comparatively subdued Nissan and Volkswagen cubicles in the direction of the ComEd presser (see the present map, above), that was already underneath approach.
ComEd $100M industrial EV rebate program
ComEd selected the Chicago Auto Present to put out the 2025 model of their useful electrification rebate packages that can provide clients entry to $100 million (up from $90M final yr) in funding alternatives designed to take away up-front value as a barrier to widespread adoption of EVs and the growth of charging infrastructure in northern Illinois. $53 million of that price range is earmarked particularly enterprise and public sector clients, with as much as $7500 obtainable for every light-duty (Class 1 or 2) EV bought by a ComEd industrial buyer.
That was when it hit me: this is why native occasions just like the Chicago Auto Present exist — to focus on offers which are distinctive to the realm, that retailers like Motor Development and Automobile and Driver and even Electrek (if we’re being trustworthy) would possibly overlook as a result of elements like geography, worldwide audiences, or another basic lack of curiosity.
Permit me then, to elucidate how a parks district, or a police division, or a automotive sharing fleet, or a supply fleet, or every other firm, incorporation, or LLC in northern Illinois can rating a fully killer deal on a Nissan LEAF.
Structuring that $9,140 Nissan LEAF deal
For 2025, Nissan’s groundbreaking LEAF S begins at simply $28,140 earlier than incentives. That’s already greater than twenty thousand US American {dollars} much less than the $49,740 common transaction value of a brand new automobile recorded simply final month. However $28,140, you’ll discover, is much more than $9,140. Right here’s how we get there:
- Nissan themselves are wanting to get these LEAFs off seller heaps to make room for the next-generation model. So keen, actually, that the corporate is providing $7,500 in buyer money proper off the bat.
- Should you’re an Illinois resident, you would get one other $4,000 from the state should you purchase between now and April thirtieth.
- Lastly, should you’re a ComEd industrial buyer you possibly can rating a 3rd rebate — this one good for as much as $7,500 should you spend greater than 50% of your time driving the automobile in a low-income or “EIEC” space.
- Now, we do some math: $28,140 – 7500 – 4000 – 7500 = $9,140 … and that’s earlier than any seller reductions or negotiations come into play. (!)
For that $9,140 you get a clean, succesful EV with 149 miles of vary* whose solely actual shortcomings are its comparatively sluggish charging pace* in comparison with one thing like a Hyundai IONIQ 5, after all, the CHAdeMO charging customary* that each different model has deserted and for which treasured few public charging choices exist.
And, admittedly, these are three very actual, very scary asterisks.
For a enterprise, although? For a parks district or metropolis official or lab courier or automotive share service that has some devoted parking house to place their very own charging into? That’s not as a lot of an impediment because it is perhaps to you and me. Heck, a younger, bold faculty pupil who realizes they will match a number of robotic lawnmowers underneath the LEAF’s spacious 23.6 cubic foot (668 liters) hatch would possibly simply discover the cash wanted to start out an LLC in Illinois and discover any variety of enjoyable, expressive, sensible information automotive they can truly repay with a part-time hustle on the 2025 Chicago Auto Present in any case!
That’s my take, anyway — you will get tickets to the 2025 Chicago Auto Present right here, discover ComEd’s enterprise and public sector EV rebate program right here, then let me know what you consider all these musings (and whether or not or not you assume I might get a number of Automowers into the again of a Fiat 500e) within the feedback.
SOURCES | IMAGES: ComEd, Nissan, the twisted thoughts of Greg Lucia.
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