Tesla is using the luxury market to finance the rollout to the mass market. It was the only way they could do it, because to achieve the economics needed for the mass market, you need a lot of money. It would have been essentially impossible for them to do it from the start, because they're not Nissan and they didn't have the ability to invest billions pre-revenue.
Witness, for example, the $5 billion gigafactory they're building, of which Tesla is contributing $2 billion. This only could happen because they now have access too good financing (their recent convertible bond issuance) which could only happen because of the success of the Model S. And the other $3 billion being contributed by partners? That wouldn't have happened if they didn't have the credibility coming from making the Model S a success. And in any case, the gigafactory would make no sense to build if they truly intended to keep to the "luxury EV's for rich people" market because it's too much capacity for that segment.
I don't know that Tesla will ever compete in the $25-30k market as you state, or at least not for a while -- their stated goal is a $35k car for the Model 3, and I wouldn't be surprised if that goes up to $40k at release, but that's still worlds apart from an $80k car in terms of affordability. Especially factoring in consumers' savings from gas (NPV of $10 - 15k), that gets to the point where they can sell serious volume, even if it's on the high end of the "everyman's car" that a $20 - 25k car would be.
Witness, for example, the $5 billion gigafactory they're building, of which Tesla is contributing $2 billion. This only could happen because they now have access too good financing (their recent convertible bond issuance) which could only happen because of the success of the Model S. And the other $3 billion being contributed by partners? That wouldn't have happened if they didn't have the credibility coming from making the Model S a success. And in any case, the gigafactory would make no sense to build if they truly intended to keep to the "luxury EV's for rich people" market because it's too much capacity for that segment.
I don't know that Tesla will ever compete in the $25-30k market as you state, or at least not for a while -- their stated goal is a $35k car for the Model 3, and I wouldn't be surprised if that goes up to $40k at release, but that's still worlds apart from an $80k car in terms of affordability. Especially factoring in consumers' savings from gas (NPV of $10 - 15k), that gets to the point where they can sell serious volume, even if it's on the high end of the "everyman's car" that a $20 - 25k car would be.