Elon Musk Raises $10 Million Selling Boring Company Flamethrowers, Jokes About Snowthrower

In less than five days after they were made available for preorders, the flamethrowers from Elon Musk’s tunneling venture, the Boring Company, were sold out. Late Wednesday night, the company website where reservations could be made said, “Flamethrower Sales Are Now Complete,” and the pre-order button was just a black box with white text that read: “20k Flamethrowers Sold.”

With a price tag of $500 a piece, completion of the 20,000 preorders means the company has effectively raised $10 million from the sales. And since the shipping will start only in the spring, it is money sitting in the company’s account, to be reassigned for whatever purpose it sees fit, which could very well have nothing to do with flamethrowers.

Musk also announced on his Twitter account that there were no more flamethrowers to order, and also that a complimentary fire extinguisher would be shipped with all flamethrowers.

The fire extinguishers were originally being sold separately, priced at $30. What will happen to those who ordered both the flamethrower and the fire extinguisher separately is not yet known, but the $30 would likely be returned to customers, given Musk’s tweet.

If someone ordered only the fire extinguisher, which in the company’s own words was “overpriced,” will they still get it? Again, the answer to that is not known at this time. What is known, though, is that sale of the extinguishers was also closed along with that of the flamethrowers.

The Boring flamethrower is the company’s latest money-making idea using products that have nothing to do with its actual business, which is to dig tunnels. Before netting this $10 million, the company also sold its Boring hats, which garnered $1 million at the time of selling out.

Reacting to some comments on his Twitter account after he announced the flamethrowers were sold out, Musk said a snowthrower sounded like a fun idea. Considering even the flamethrower first came up on Twitter, who knows, maybe the snowthrower will become real too?

As for the actual job of digging tunnels, Musk said in November the Boring Company was bidding to “fund, build & operate a high-speed Loop connecting Chicago O’Hare airport to downtown.”