New car sales in the U.S. are depressed (recessed?), but sales of hybrids are up. While accounting for only 2.2 percent of the total U.S. market share, CNN says "Hybrid cars [are] flying out of showrooms." Indeed. Industry sales of some 350k hybrids translated into a 38 percent jump in '07. Toyota's Prius captured 51 percent of the hybrid market. Although most analysts see rising gas prices as the main sales driver, CNN trots out a tree hugger to convince you that many if not most consumers are [still] buying Priora to make a statement: "My decision is a very political decision," asserts Kim Fenske. "I want to get people in this country off their dependency on foreign oil." Anyway, R.L. Polk industry analyst Lonnie Miller figures hybrid sales increased because buyers have more non-goofy-looking options. "It's a good call on automakers' parts to not make their hybrids so funky and out of body style than what's already out there." Yes, well, Miller says 2008 hybrid sales should increase by 30 percent or more. "I can't see the hybrid category totally chilling out." Dude.
Is the following statement too big a stretch?
“Buy a Prius and you get to support capitalism and the environment. Buy a GM and you get to support socialism and despotism. Who would have thought?”
Socialism because both the UAW and GM lobby for different brands of socialism with the money they make off of you. Despotism because most of the oil producing countries are run by despots, so if you are not saving fuel…
“Industry sales of some 350k hybrids (year-to-date) translates into a 38 percent jump.”
That’s not year to date. That was 350k hybrids and 38% growth for the year 2007.
Kevin: …350k hybrids and 38% growth for the year 2007.
True and I’m sure RF will sort that (back) out.
Don’t tell me that was one of those editor insertions :)
Glenn Swanson:
Kevin: …350k hybrids and 38% growth for the year 2007.
True and I’m sure RF will sort that (back) out.
Doh! Editor run amok. Text amended.
With my 2008 Prius (had a 2005, traded it in), as recently as last autumn, I had people I didn’t even know more-or-less button-hole (accost) me with defense mechanism (which I couldn’t have cared less about) such as “well I need this SUV/pickup/humungous monstrosity for (fill in the blank)” and act all defensive when they saw me walking up to my Prius, for example, at the Credit Union.
Now, I just get people asking politely about the MPG, the cost, whether I have to plug it in (sigh), and so forth.
Amazing what $3.56 per gallon does to people’s attitudes, isn’t it?
A lady that I work with just bought a Hybrid Civic last Friday. I asked her how much more it cost than a regular Civic, and she told me “$5,000, but I’m doing this to reduce my carbon footprint.” Sounds like a political statement to me. By the way, her previous car was a Subaru Forester.
Lumbergh21 :
A lady that I work with just bought a Hybrid Civic last Friday. I asked her how much more it cost than a regular Civic, and she told me “$5,000, but I’m doing this to reduce my carbon footprint.”
I’m so sick of that phrase: ‘carbon footprint’. Add that to the list of buzz-words for the trendy.
I wonder if she’s giving up many conveniences at home that would also reduce said… ‘footprint’.
Plus, with all of these hybrids, think of the SMUG emissions. ;)
So a regular 5spd Corolla already gets 41mpg/highway without any gimmicks or costly gadgets. What if Toyota put a Prius-style (low efficient wedge) body on the Corolla platform? Maybe 44-46mpg highway? Gas-sipping low-tech for a buying audience far larger than the Prius?
But we know that isn’t going to happen as the ecoego demand for a “hybrid” badge on the side of a car is apparently worth a $7K premium…and Toyota ain’t stupid. Too bad; it’s the hordes of fuel sippers that will save the environment, not these niche (350K) vehicles.
Menno: I had people I didn’t even know more-or-less button-hole (accost) me with defense mechanism (which I couldn’t have cared less about) such as “well I need this SUV/pickup/humungous monstrosity for (fill in the blank)” and act all defensive when they saw me walking up to my Prius, for example, at the Credit Union.
I think that is part Prius and part of the small car ownership in America experience right now. I get that with my VW Cabrio too. People first wonder why this bearded guy is driving this chick car. Then they see the baby seats and quit worrying about who I might share a bed with (my wife of course). Then they start trying to justify what they drive to me.
I say drive what you want to drive. Smaller is better I think and hopefully other people will feel the same so maybe our oil demand will drop here in America and prices might drop or fix at a certain price for a while you know?
I prefer to make my choices quietly and lead by example if you know what I mean. Hopefully others will agree. If they don’t they can keep buying $90 of gas every few days.
Sammy, the Prius makes direct financial sense when you compare it to its competitors in the midsize segment (where it lives according to interior room). I just finished a spreadsheet for our next purchase, comparing to Civic/Corolla and Accord/Camry over 5 years with gas assumed at $3.75/gallon, and it ends up a few hundred more expensive than the smaller cars and a couple thousand cheaper than the real competitors.
The old Prius (pre-04) was built on an Echo frame and wasn’t that popular, although people still drive them (putting the lie to the FUD about battery packs needing replacement after a few years, so they provide that service if nothing else).
Oh, and the ‘niche’ is only that small because the rest of the hybrids aren’t compelling. The Prius itself is firmly in the Top 10 these days.
Sammy Hagar, Toyota sold 20K Priuses last month. Is the Malibu, then, at 15K in sales, a “niche” product, too?
Literally every fill up someone will come over to ask me about my Prius’ mileage. We bought ours last summer and at around 15,000 miles, I estimate we have already saved $1500 in gas compared to my old BMW. Add to that a $850 tax credit and our $22k new car cost us less than $20k after less than a year’s worth of savings.
hansbos- And if you bought it on 3-5 year terms like most people the alledged “hybrid premium” is spread out over that time also. As I have been harping on, savings with a Prius can start DAY ONE.
It is rather odd, I see a lot of postings and media blah about “hybrid attitudes”, smugness and all but every person I actually meet who owns one (whether in person or on the net) seems pretty low-key and live and let live. Zealots seem the exception rather than the rule. (Yes Lundbergh21, I know there are some like you met).
Ironically this is not true of their alledged critics.
Amused,
Bunter
I am convinced of the need for higher fuel efficiency cars, however I am not convinced that hybrids make economic sense. The same is true of diesels given the premium being charged for the fuel right now.
There are some great relatively high mileage (and high performance) 4 cylinder engines out there (The Audi 2.0T comes to mind immediately). High performance and 30 plus miles to the gallon works for me.
M1EK: I can’t argue w/the space advantage of the Prius over the Corolla; and obviously, if gas prices continue to climb, the hybrid price premium becomes less of a factor.
KixStart: Niche as in 350K hybrids sold in ’07 vs. all other passenger cars. Maybe I’m incorrect about this, but I believe the Prius had 51% of overall hybrid sales, so it would have been 178,500 units; or 14,875/month. Thus, while Prius accounts for half of all hybrid sales, it is about even w/one model (Malibu) of a very bloated medium sized segment. Sort of niche, no?
BTW: Just for the record, I’m pro-diesel; I’d rather buy a German diesel any day over a Japanese hybrid (but alas, it’s not an easy feat these days).
To all of the naysayers out there, I was once like you. I still think that in many, or even most instances, a hybrid is purchased as a political statement. However, I recently compared a new Prius against a new Corolla (I still hold fast to the idea that the Prius competes with compacts not mid-size cars). I now agree that the Prius does have a reasonable time frame for payback on initial investment. I assumed an average of 15,000 miles driven per year, a 4% return on investment, a constant gas cost of $4 per gallon (I didn’t want to deal with estimated inflation for the cost of gas) and used TTAC to get the “true” price difference between the Corolla and the Prius. The Prius pays back in about three years the initial capital investment versus buying a Corolla. Now, that doesn’t mean me or my wife are about to run out and buy a Prius (or a Corolla for that matter), but I will no longer say that purchasing a Pirus is a solely political statement. I do believe that it finally makes financial sense. This may not necessarily be true for other hybrids.
How can this be? I thought the established wisdom was that Priuses are only bought by latte sipping, granola eating, tree hugging, college teaching hippies who want others to see them in a green vehicle. Who would have thought that class of damned libs grew 38% in a single year. The Republicans must be quaking in their boots.
I almost bought a prius before I bought a sports car. What turned me off was a 3-6 month wait (2005), paying MSRP, and no manual option.
I ended up switching jobs and now walk to work (1 mile) or take the train. My Sports car is now > 3 years old and I’m averaging about 8k miles/year. I think if I had bought a prius and was in the same situation I am now, I wouldn’t have seen an ROI and been bored now with the vehicle itself. At least I have the fun with the sports car on the weekends. YMMV.
The next car will be a subcompact to replace the compact neon (161k) probably in 2-3 years. Hopefully we will have a bigger diesl or diesel/hybrid selection by then.
You guys have some major issues.
The Prius is great because you can use it under certain driving conditions without fuel!! Diesels, regular high MPG car needs fuel regardless of the driving conditions!!
I don’t own a Prius but I don’t bash their owners. It is a good thing hybrid sales are increasing. I support anything, hybrids, E85, hydrogen, etc.. to get U.S. off of oil is a good thing.
In the future, I hope they can develop hybrids with longer distances with only using the electric engine.
I still do not know why all mail trucks are not hybrids.
Thus, while Prius accounts for half of all hybrid sales, it is about even w/one model (Malibu) of a very bloated medium sized segment. Sort of niche, no?
It’s a top-ten car. Has that not penetrated yet? If the Prius is a niche car, then precious few cars AREN’T.
I still hold fast to the idea that the Prius competes with compacts not mid-size cars
Which just goes to show that FUD works, don’t it?
It’s midsize where it counts – on the inside. Were it not a hybrid, you’d be climbing all over yourself to congratulate them on making such an efficient use of exterior space.
Sammy observed “the ecoego demand for a “hybrid” badge on the side of a car is apparently worth a $7K premium…”
Oooh, think of the profit margin on that HYBRID sticker! Now, I suppose Toyota would sue me for infringing on their intellectual property if I sold replica stickers to wannabe Ecotists, but maybe I could come up with something that’s practically the same … how about “MUTANT”?
CNN trots out a tree hugger […]: “My decision is a very political decision,” asserts Kim Fenske. “I want to get people in this country off their dependency on foreign oil.”
That is quite a conservative premise and has little to do with tree hugging.
When making comparisons I think people need to use real world mileage and not use the EPA estimate.
As an example when I drove a 2004 Corolla with automatic my real world mileage was 28 mpg. I currently drive a 1st generation Xb and I get consistently 31 mpg. Most people report real world mileage for the Prius at 40 to 45 mpg..
To support Sherman, it would also help when commenting to use “combined” cycle (50/50 city and highway). Saying that one gets favorable highway mileage (“so what’s the point in Prius”) ignores the fact that most potential buyers will be big city commuters to whom smooth highway sailing is a pipe dream and not particularly relevant.
Lumbergh,
If you only saved 1500 in fuel, do you realize that the increased depreciation over what you traded, or could have bought used, dwarfed that? You will need to own that car for another 7 years before the savings really starts.
I am not saying you made a bad decision. If you want a new car, and you can pay or it, then that’s wonderful. What I AM saying is that buying a new car to save money is almost an impossible thing to do.
If you don’t include depreciation, taxes, and insurance as costs, then you aren’t really making a proper calculation. If the government REALLY wanted to reduce fuel use, instead of CAFE, they would simply outlaw all taxes on cars that get over 30 mpg (or some other number). That would do more than almost anything else they could possibly think of.
Landcrusher you are correct rushing out to buy a new car to save money will not save money but people who are buying a new car because they are going to buy a new car anyway can and do save money by choosing a more fuel efficient vehicle.
In my experience people who are frugal(professional cheapskates like myself) know eaxactly how much money they will be saving with their purchase. I know eaxtly how much my car costs me including insurance maintenance and gas and now that my car is paid for it is even easier to do. I will not save any money by purchasing a Prius, but when the time comes to replace my vehicle a prius will probably be looked at.
If the government REALLY wanted to reduce fuel use, instead of CAFE, they would simply outlaw all taxes on cars that get over 30 mpg (or some other number).
Or perhaps tie vehicle registration fees to fuel economy, and make sure the differences are serious.
It would be pretty easy to implement. For instance, set the initial level at whatever you want your current target to be, say 35mpg combined cycle. That’s where your “normal” license fees would be. Everything with a higher number get rewarded, everything with a smaller number gets penalized. Once in a while you can move the base number up and stimulate further behavior modification.
Explain to me again why diesel went up so quickly just as diesel cars were ready to make a big debut in America?
Same number of trucks right? Same number of trains right? Same number of busses right? Same number of big ships right?
The higher price implies increased demand or decreased production or a combination of both.
Which is it?
How far ahead in the future do you think the auto manufacturers’ analysts can accurately predict the price of various commodities?
Maybe Toyota sees further into the future or maybe they start their product development earlier than car comapnies like GM?
I’d have to think that a multi-billion dollar company has some of the best paid analysts in the world working for them either directly or buying some really good futures reports.
I mean we might be shocked that we are seeing a 10 cent rise in gas (like last night here in TN) or $3.43 gasoline but maybe the people at the top have a pretty good idea of what things will cost 5 years down the road meaning a good leader will start planning products now while a poor business leader waits until the last second.
About diesel – When we switched to cleaner diesel regulations, our refining capacity actually went down. Diesel is thus in short supply, and it takes time to make new refining capacity. The first new refining projects in decades have now begun as a result of the demand. Regulation and NIMBYism kept the desire to increase or even maintain refining capacity artificially low over the last couple decades.
Hobo,
If you penalize cars over the target, it’s not really helping. What happens is that you create a disincentive to replace older vehicles. It’s not easy with some taxes to modify behavior because a registration tax does not necessarily reduce consumption, but can actually decrease it. The carrot is linked, but the stick is not. Understand?