What happened

Shares of electric truck and SUV manufacturer Rivian Automotive (RIVN -3.66%) are suffering a mini sell-off on Friday afternoon, with shares down 2.2% as of 3:30 p.m. ET, and for a very strange reason: It's trying to sell a lot of electric trucks and SUVs.

The problem, it seems, is how Rivian is selling them.

So what

Specifically, as The Wall Street Journal reports, Rivian is holding a sort of used car lot sale of its R1T electric trucks this Saturday, with the crucial caveat that these are not actually used EVs at all, but rather brand spanking new EVs.  

Lacking a dealership network to take delivery of its vehicles as they roll off the assembly line, Rivian R1Ts and R1Ss that have been produced, but not yet found buyers to whom they can be delivered, instead accumulate on a car lot outside the company's factory in Normal, Illinois. As recently as last year, this wasn't an issue, because Rivian had a miles-long waiting list of customers who wanted to buy its EVs as soon as they were produced.

Today, however, as Rivian ramps up production to a targeted 50,000 units per year, a supply/demand imbalance has emerged. Simply put, Rivian is supplying more EVs than its customers are demanding. (Or more precisely, more electric trucks than customers are demanding. The company still has a waiting list to take possession of its R1S electric SUVs).

And so Rivian is trying out a novel solution -- inviting residents of Normal and its surroundings to come to the factory car lot, browse the extra R1Ts it has already built, and buy one if they want.

Now what

There are pluses and minuses to this tactic. Plus one, most obviously, is that Rivian gets a chance to goose its sales numbers and get a bit more cash coming into its coffers. Plus two is that Rivian's novel approach is generating some free publicity for the company. (Thanks for that, Wall Street Journal!)

There is, however, a potential minus in the fact that Rivian is holding what looks for all intents and purposes like a fire sale (albeit without the discounts) of unwanted electric trucks outside its own flagship factory -- highlighting the fact that demand for the company's EVs is no longer quite as robust as it once seemed. This is a bad look for the company, and for the time being at least, this seems to be the interpretation that investors are fixating on as they sell off Rivian stock.

That could change in a hurry, however, if come the end of the weekend Rivian is able to announce some huge success from its Saturday sale. Tune back in on Tuesday and we'll let you know if that happened.