Automaker Tesla is opening more showrooms on tribal lands to avoid state laws barring direct sales::Tesla is ramping up efforts to open showrooms on tribal lands where it can sell directly to consumers, circumventing laws in states that bar vehicle manufacturers from also being retailers in favor of the dealership model.
Historical legacy. It made sense when they were first rolling out. Someone would take the risk of trying to build up a market for these really expensive new devices and then the factory would swoop in and undercut them and destroy their business after they had done all the initial leg work of creating demand for the vehicles. They wanted protection from this.
Well, cars are now everywhere in the US market and it doesn’t take a whole lot of effort anymore to convince someone they need a car, and not just a horse. But the laws protecting “car market development” in the former of dealerships never went away.