What Was The First Successful Battery Electric Vehicle?

The year 2026 has inadvertently become the year of the electric car, which is a boon for manufacturers, toll processors, suppliers of raw materials and dealers alike.

Thanks partly due to a global energy crisis, partly due to the rise of renewables and partly due to the success of cars such as the Renault 5 EV, electric cars are having a moment, which makes it worth reflecting on the first time EVs sold in significant quantities.

Long before the Tesla Model 3 or even the Nissan Leaf, there was an early EV company whose success very nearly changed the world of motoring.

What Was The First Successful EV?

The Detroit Electric was a car by the Anderson Electric Car Company that sold 13,000 units, a remarkable amount for an electric car following the release of the Ford Model T.

For context, this was the highest-selling EV up until the Mitsubishi i-MiEV, which more than doubled its sales but was quickly dwarfed by sales of the Nissan Leaf, the first modern EV to sell in significant quantities.

The Detroit Electric was first sold in 1907 and would remain on the market for 22 years, one of the longest manufacturing runs of any EV, and indicative of the crossroads the American motoring landscape was at.

Advertised as having a range of 80 miles, one test showed that a Detroit Electric had a range of 211 miles, an astonishing feat even by modern standards.

Its peak of sales was in the 1910s, aided by the First World War and its inherent disruptions to the petrol supply chain.

Why Did The Detroit Electric Fail?

However, the sudden drop of petroleum prices changed motoring history forever and shaped entire nations around the petrol car. This very quickly turned the electric car from a vital part of city living into an irrelevance.

Despite this, the Detroit Electric was still sold until 1939, 12 years after the death of Mr Anderson, mostly selling cars to order.

After the Second World War, very few EVs would be sold for years. The highest-selling EV of the 20th century post-1945 sold just 4440 units, barely a third of what the Detroit Electric sold.

How Can Suppliers Respond To The EV Boom?

Ultimately, the Detroit Electric’s fate offers both warnings and opportunities to EV suppliers today, particularly if the complex electronics of your EV relies on barium titanate.

Manufacturers should work closely with their suppliers and ensure that every step of their operations can be scaled up or down to meet the needs of customers.

The carmaking process is only as fast as its slowest stage, and delays in access to vital materials can potentially cause companies to miss their chance at striking whilst the iron is hot.