First, I agree it's important to put Tesla recalls in context with the greater automotive industry, so I think what you posted is great info. The only thing I'd disagree with is that the numbers compared to Tesla, and relative media coverage, is surprising. It seems expected to me.
Tesla bills itself not as an automaker, but a tech company. So, it makes sense they'd have a larger media footprint, which covers not just the automotive industry, but the tech industry media as well. This isn't unfair, considering they get the benefit of a tech-based market cap to go with it [1].
They also put themselves in headlines more often than other car companies with outlandish claims such as Musk saying, "At this point, I think I know more about manufacturing than anyone currently alive on earth." [2] When Musk and the company put themselves in headlines so often, it makes sense that the media would cover them more. This is likely a direct result of their advertising strategy, to create buzz [3], so I think media coverage of failures is a direct result.
You could argue that's Musk, not the company, but they made the strategic decision that Musk is their PR function when they became the only car company to dissolve their PR department in 2020 [4].
One last thing I noticed was that the source of the recall data comes from the NHTSA [5], and they don't seem to distinguish recalls between different brands owned by the same company (for example, Ford's recalls seem like they would include both Ford and Lincoln, GM includes Chevrolet, GMC, etc.) Tesla's 20 recalls in 2022 cover I believe the four models they made in 2022, while Ford's 67 recalls are across the 39 models under the Ford brand and five models under Lincoln (I counted these by looking at the drop-down selectors on KBB's value estimator [6]).
In short, Tesla exploits the hype machine; is it surprising that their recalls are hyped as well?
Tesla bills itself not as an automaker, but a tech company. So, it makes sense they'd have a larger media footprint, which covers not just the automotive industry, but the tech industry media as well. This isn't unfair, considering they get the benefit of a tech-based market cap to go with it [1].
They also put themselves in headlines more often than other car companies with outlandish claims such as Musk saying, "At this point, I think I know more about manufacturing than anyone currently alive on earth." [2] When Musk and the company put themselves in headlines so often, it makes sense that the media would cover them more. This is likely a direct result of their advertising strategy, to create buzz [3], so I think media coverage of failures is a direct result.
You could argue that's Musk, not the company, but they made the strategic decision that Musk is their PR function when they became the only car company to dissolve their PR department in 2020 [4].
One last thing I noticed was that the source of the recall data comes from the NHTSA [5], and they don't seem to distinguish recalls between different brands owned by the same company (for example, Ford's recalls seem like they would include both Ford and Lincoln, GM includes Chevrolet, GMC, etc.) Tesla's 20 recalls in 2022 cover I believe the four models they made in 2022, while Ford's 67 recalls are across the 39 models under the Ford brand and five models under Lincoln (I counted these by looking at the drop-down selectors on KBB's value estimator [6]).
In short, Tesla exploits the hype machine; is it surprising that their recalls are hyped as well?
[1] https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/tesla-...
[2] https://www.thestreet.com/markets/elon-musk-ted-talk
[3] https://fourweekmba.com/tesla-marketing-strategy/
[4] https://electrek.co/2020/10/06/tesla-dissolves-pr-department...
[5] https://datahub.transportation.gov/Automobiles/NHTSA-Recalls...
[6] https://www.kbb.com/car-prices/