Kia accelerates roll-out plan for Soul EV

Originally, the Kia Soul EV went on sale in California in October 2014 with Oregon and some East Coast markets to follow. However, stronger than expected demand has caused Kia to want to scale up production faster than their factories can handle.

“For the next stage, we were originally planning on hitting the east coast, but we are changing that around a little bit. You’ll see more availability,” is what Orth Hedrick, VP or product planning told AutoblogGreen in February.Kia Soul EV plugged in and charging

“The issue is actually getting enough cars,” EV Product Manager Steve Kosowski told Charged EVs. “As soon as we can get the supply, we’re going to start selling the car outside of California. What we don’t want to do is starve our California dealers after they’ve already invested in chargers and tools and training. The Soul EV is the first electric car we’ve sold outside of Korea. So, we want to make sure that the quality is there, that the suppliers and the distributors and the dealers and everybody in the whole chain is ready and there are no problems.”

Kia hopes to announce its roll-out plan in April, perhaps at the 2015 New York Auto Show?

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