We honestly thought Tesla products couldn't get any more ridiculous than those impractical Tesla drinking glasses. But Elon Musk's eccentric electric car company has just served up another unlikely piece of product design – a Cybertruck cat tray.
While apparently inspired by the angular shape of Tesla's electric pick-up, the company's foray into pet care is rather low-tech. There's nothing cyber about it, and there's no stainless steel alloy frame. It's a cardboard box.
My cat likes it pic.twitter.com/WwxUInxsrqAugust 4, 2023
See more
At first, we thought it was a joke, but no; a $13 Tesla Cybertruck Corrugated Cat House really is available for sale on the Chinese version of the Tesla website. Measuring 56x41x25cm, it's described as having a futuristic shape "embedded with thick corrugated paper to meet the nature and daily needs of cats".
I guess they realised 'corrugated' sounds more futuristic than 'cardboard'. However, despite the product's apparent simplicity, there's disagreement about what its purpose is. The product page URL describes it as a 'cat house' (not a shiba inu house?), and the product description in Chinese appears to call it a 'multi-functional cat nest'. Some think it's a litter tray, which would make cardboard a strange choice of material. Others think it's intended to be a cat scratcher. So far I've only seen a couple of images of a cat using one, and they seem to have decided the cardboard Cybertruck is a bed.
Either way, I can't help but feel that Tesla missed a trick here. As a car manufacturer, it could have made a moving vehicle for cats that could allow them to drive around, perhaps teaming up with Musk's Neuralink to pair it with brain implants that would allow kitties to control the vehicle with their minds. Or it could at least have made a luxury cat carry case.
That would make more sense given Tesla's remit. But no, this is simply a stationary cardboard box for cats to lie in... or maybe to poo in. And while it might seem cheap for a Tesla product, let's just emphasise one thing again: it's a cardboard box.
So what's going on? Is Tesla branching out into a new product line? Perhaps the company was inspired by a video we saw all the way back in 2021 (see above), in which one fan beat the genuine Cybertruck into production by two years with a DIY cat Cybertruck. Or perhaps it's preparing for a trademark battle with the European Tesla brand, which produces a Smart Cat Toilet with WiFi connectivity. Only time will tell.
Get the Creative Bloq Newsletter
Daily design news, reviews, how-tos and more, as picked by the editors.
Joe is a regular freelance journalist and editor at Creative Bloq. He writes news, features and buying guides and keeps track of the best equipment and software for creatives, from video editing programs to monitors and accessories. A veteran news writer and photographer, he now works as a project manager at the London and Buenos Aires-based design, production and branding agency Hermana Creatives. There he manages a team of designers, photographers and video editors who specialise in producing visual content and design assets for the hospitality sector. He also dances Argentine tango.
