Welcome to We Are EV

As a fast car and motorsport fan from a young age, cars have always been a part of my life. Having also been interested in computers ever since I can remember this developed into a general interest in disruptive and emerging technologies.  When I joined We Are EV in 2019 I was driving my Nissan Leaf 24kWh Acenta, which I had bought 4 years previously on a leap of faith with no test drive! Before then I owned a diesel pickup truck which at the time was essential for my dry stone walling business, this was my small effort towards local conservation while at the same time earning a living for a number of years. How did I get into electric vehicles? It was around 2008 when I saw an advert in a motorsport magazine for a fully electric sports car, I was instantly intrigued by it and wondered if anything would ever come of this idea, the car was called a Roadster by a small Silicon Valley start up by the name of Tesla Motors. The Roadster was basically a re-engineered Lotus with parts based on technology developed by AC Propulsion and several thousand laptop batteries fitted in the floor. Some years later I was told of a story that General Motors in the 90's had developed and brought to market a fully electric vehicle based on a concept from the late 80's. I watched a documentary film called Who Killed the Electric Car that told the story of GM's EV1 which I was fascinated by. Later on I learned that there had been electric cars as early as the start of the 20th century. I was driving my truck into town one day to get some shopping and thought to myself, what a waste of fuel, I was also aware of causing a lot of unnecessary air pollution just for a shopping trip. I started to consider that I could get myself an electric bike as these were starting to become available and were much cheaper than an electric car which were only just coming onto the market. Living in The Cotswolds at the time I wanted something that was capable off-road and being early days for Ebikes there was not much available that fitted my needs. I decided to build my own. I imported parts and built my dream Ebike, I then started a small business building Ebikes for other people which soon progressed into an online shop where I would sell DIY conversion kits and offer tutorials and support for home builders. Why sell electric cars? I enjoyed my Ebike but it couldn't quite do what my truck could do and came to the conclusion that I should replace my truck with an electric car. There was nothing available at the time that was capable of carrying a tonne of stone but decided that I could make do by getting materials delivered to site and decided on a brand new Nissan Leaf in 2015 which was more than capable of carrying tools, boots and wet weather gear. I honestly never looked back and immediately became an advocate for electric cars, convincing various family members to take the step to go all electric. When I met James I was mainly doing private hire driving work in my trusty Nissan Leaf. I was one of only 4 electric taxi drivers in Bristol in those days. My first electric car was genuinely the best car I ever bought and in my time of ownership it was a builders van, an Ebike parts delivery vehicle, a taxi and my personal run around. I covered around 115,000 miles in my Leaf and it never let me down, in fact it still drove like new when I sold it. I still see my old Leaf around sometimes as it's now living a much more relaxed life doing school runs and local shopping trips with it's new owner. Having previously worked in a sales position at a Citroen dealership in my younger years and with my knowledge of electric vehicles, I naturally took to the role of selling used EVs. My experience working with DC circuits and on building sites in the past set me in good stead to get involved in the solar installation part of the company too. I have also worked extensively on our campervan projects which are great fun and bring our customers many happy memories. What a time to be alive!