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To put it simply, Honda’s Insight sold 4,226 units last month while the Prius sold 18,886. Through August, Toyota sold 93,810 Priora while the Insight motivated only 14,045 buyers. Honda has tacitly admitted that the Insight is not up to snuff. But upgrades could take years. Honda could just as easily have the long-rumored Fit Hybrid ready in the same time. Would it be a better Prius fighter? Or will Honda Hybrids be stuck wandering the desert until, say, the CR-Z arrives?
48 Comments on “Ask the Best and Brightest: Would a Fit Hybrid Rescue Honda’s Insight Fail?...”
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Is that a miniature golden standing next to the Fit? It makes the Fit look like a midsize CUV.
It’s easy. 2 types of people buy the Prius. The elite greenie posers who need the Prius badge, and the practical types that have done a long term calculation and figure it will be cheaper over the 15 years they plan to own the car vs a less expensive compact vehicle.
The Insight fails on both counts. it doesn’t have the right badge, and thus the green street cred, and it isn’t sufficiently cheap enough to buy to offset the lower mileage rating.
Plus it is ugly and cheap looking.
Will the Fit help? Probably not. How about a 6th gear for the Fit? I bet that would bring the MPG rating over 40mpg on the highway. Wouldn’t that be a cheaper fix?
4,000/month is better than a Fit Hybrid would do.
Drive even the second Gen Prius first, Let alone fhe far suyperior and bette rlooking inside and out third generation, before you dismiss it.
I used to be critical of the Prius because of all the bad press I read in Enthusiast mags, until I had a chance to rent and drive it for a total of 4 days in the Los Angelrs area. It was EXCELLENT. It never went below 50 MPG around town, and 48 MPG on I-5 from LA to San Diego, at 75 MPH. On a leisurly drive around beautiful, scenic Palos Verdes, it got 62 and 69 MPG!! And that was thhe OLD prius, the new one is better.
The FIT (non-hybrid) is good enough for its mission. Making it a hybrid would only offer very marginal improvement and a far higher price that would eliminate all the fuel savings and then some.
The only REAL and Successful Prius fighter Honda can (can it?) make is one that is Expressly made as an ueber-aero, ueber-efficient Hybrid that exceeds even the prius in refinement, efficiency AND interior quality, which the Cheapo new Insight sure does not have.
No, but a diesel Fit would take the game to a park not already owned by Toyota. They could get all the pipe smoking deep thinkers while Toyota keeps all the female-ish greenies.
As the baseball saying goes,Honda needs to hit ’em where they ain’t. A hybrid Odyssey or Ridgeline perhaps, or even better, a hybrid s2000.
@mikesdak
How about ANY S2000? That’s a car Honda should have replaced. And I agree, a hybrid S2000 would be far more unique and interesting than the Insight or a hybrid Fit. Alas, they probably couldn’t even sell 200/month.
I submit there is a third, albeit much smaller group of Prius buyers (like a friend of ours) that like the sort of funky aero-like look, likes the size, the fit and the finish, has the dough to buy it and doesn’t much care about the “green cred” it might have. Just saying.
A hybrid Fit makes no economic sense, so the answer is no.
As TRL say, a diesel Fit would be impressive.
I disagree on the hybrid Odyssey idea. You’d end up with the same formula as a hybrid Tahoe, which doesn’t work too well. Adding $10k and 4 mpg to the Odyssey wouldn’t move more Odysseys or take market away from Toyota/Chrysler.
I think the S2000 is all but dead, but hybridizing it answers a question nobody is asking.
With gasoline under $3, no. Hybrids will not become mainstream, especially if they dont look different.
I thought the new Insight would be a hit, but either the Toyota is better value at a higher price point (probably so) or the general public is more savvy than I thought and has heard about Honda’s awful CVT. After replacing 3 CVT’s in the first 60,000 miles on our Civic GX, and no manual option on this new Insight, I would not even consider it.
Interesting thought dwford.
Being the second – and a less-evolved – entrant into a market-space inhabited by label conscious buyers has killed the Insight.
Would a hybrid Fit fare better? The Fit seems more utilitarian – to me. But, this whole category of cars is the answer to a question that no-one asked.
Clean diesel anyone?
Diesels are ideal for much larger vehicles than the Fit. First they should be installed on the Ridgeline and the Odyssey and the Pilot, then on the Accord, and then, only if gas goes to $5 again, to the Civic and lastly to the Fit. They add weight and especially COST on every car. Honda dropped its plan to offer its largest cars and trucks with Diesels in the US earlier this yeart. The Fit does not have a chance to get a diesel any time soon.
ALso, no hybrid that looks just like its non-hybrid sibling has had any serious sales success. That explains the huge success of the prius, while the Civic Hybrid never really caught up. Hybrid Odysseys have some merit, since these vans do a lot of around town and suburbia driving (soccer moms), but already a loaded Odyssey is quite expensive at close to $40k?
The Insight has only been available since April 2009 so you can’t compare total year statistics with the Prius which counts sales since January 2009. I’m not sure why everyone hates this car. It’s seats are made from renewable plant fabric – first ever for a car. It offers Prius like fuel economy for $2k less. Which it takes 6-8 years of heavy driving for the Prius to make up the purchase price decision.
I also thought GM’s “mild” hybrid was a good idea but poorly executed (No one messes up good ideas like GM). GM labeled them as Hybrids which put them in comparison to real parallel hybrids (then made them a laughing stock as this was their half assed attempt to make a hybrid). From an efficiency standpoint, I did like the easy and relatively cheap idea of increasing any car’s city mpg was to install systems that could function off batter power when at a stop light without the need for the engine to run. It was simply a bigger battery, heavier duty alternator and less belt driven devices. I normally don’t use A/C unless its really hot or I’m going > 55 mph. I usually shut my own engine off a long lights I can time. Easier with a stick as don’t have to shift into park and back to drive. After I started doing it in my 08 Silverado 5.3 – I got 2 mpg better city taking away all the useless idling at lights > 1 minute (which are most where I live).
I drive a car with crappy 17.5mpg average (03 Passat wagon V6) and I’m jealous of my friend’s w/ Priuses who get such great mileage. There is something satisfying about getting great gas mileage in an ongoing way (even if you have to pay the same cost all up front to get that ability). It can see it being worth it to, every week, get a sense that I’ve escaped from having to pay $50/wk to keep my tank full.
jaje: making seats out of hemp (or whatever they are) cannot overcome the Insight’s many purported faults. One of which is the fact that its fuel economy is not Prius-like.
Honda is focusing too hard on Toyota. How about produce an even funner Honda Fit? A Fit with the K-Series motor, re-tuned suspension and LSD from the Civic Si?
Insight is done by Honda’s inability to use a real hybrid drivetrain instead of the same-shaft motor-generator assist that they employ. It’s essentially the same as the ghetto hybrids that GM was pushing, minus the rubber belt. Even the free-flow cylinder deactivation cannot help. And it’s not like Toyota is so unreasonable to deal with, as the story of the two-mode hybrids tells us. It’s just that Honda does not want to use Toyota’s technology out of typical Japanese face-saving folly.
@ TRL. I like your thinking here. A diesel Fit with Honda Europe’s 2.2 diesel motor would be a Japanese answer to the VW and Audi (A3) diesel offerings and they could do it for a much lower price. If properly marketed they could attract people who are looking for high MPG to look at it versus a hybrid. If the price is under $20K and the combined MPG was in the high 40’s it might work.
The only way it could work is if it was significantly cheaper than the Prius. Since the Insight is, more or less, a Fit Hybrid now I cannot see how Honda could pull that off without bleeding margin. The Fit is a good car, but it’s already expensive. The hybrid premium would put it at loggerheads with the Prius anyway, and it’d still go down in flames because it’s a) cheaper-feeling and b) IMA is just not as good as Toyota’s HSD.
The other issue is packaging. The Fit has no trunk space to spare for a battery pack, even if you remove the spare tire. Unless you raise the floor (what the Insight does, and why it’s a longer car) and sacrifice a lot of cargo space and the flat rear floor I don’t know how they’d even fit a battery in there.
I could see a hybrid version of the Honda Freed. There’s enough space and uniqueness there to make a case for it.
There is a 4th Prius buyer: Extreme Suburbanites that work in metro areas with HOV lanes that allow single occupancy Hybrid vehicles access.
So many argue that cars should be lighter and simpler and cheaper. When a company tries to follow that advice it totally blows up in their face.
The Insight is built on the same platform as the Fit and thus pretty much IS a Fit Hybrid. Honda’s problem is that the current Prius is all around a better car than the Insight, gets better fuel economy and is priced in the same neighborhood. Building an Insight almost as good as a Prius for a thousand or two less is not worthy of Honda. Has the Accord ever been pitched as almost as good as a Camry, but a little cheaper?
Honda needs to make the Insight a viable Prius competitor. End of story.
Hell no.
Not sure what if anything will rescue Honda / Acura. Styling sucks. Quality has tanked. Dealer service/support has gone awol.
I used to be a Honda fanboy but the past couple of years watching their product releases and my own ownership experience with 3 of their vehicles spanning the past decade with the latest one being a real POS has changed all that….
My crystal ball is not forecasting a bright future for Honda. Maybe they should quit jacking around trying to make airplanes and get back to a short list of carlines to focus upon.
I wonder how much more data it will take to get the hybrid-haters to finally acknowledge the fact that if “looking like a hybrid” was the only reason for the Prius to succeed, the Insight would be doing just as well if not better.
More than this much, apparently.
The Fit is a small car, the Prius is an EPA rated midsize. Bottom line of the whole economy thing between Honda and Toyota is that Toyota’s Hybrid Synergy Drive works better than Honda’s IMA setup. In short, no, a Fit hybrid will not make a dent in Prius sales.
Knocking off the Prius shape didn’t help the cause, especially when your design is suddenly competing with the previous generation of the other guy because they simultaneously came up with a better looking version of their own car.
Car shopper: “I’m interested in one of those Hybrid cars with the hatchback”
Friend: “Oh you mean the Toyota Prius? Yeah they’re pretty good on gas”
Car shopper: “Yeah, I guess that must be the one I’m thinking of, I’ll go to the dealer and check it out.”
That plus it gets poorer gas mileage than the Prius. People don’t do the math when it comes to ROI.
A hybrid Fit probably would not be a sales success-When Honda tried to counter the sales of the Prius with a hybrid Civic the results were disappointing, probably the same for a hybrid Fit.
As the old saying goes: “Hit ’em where they ain’t!”
How about a hybrid S2000, a hybrid Odyssey, or a diesel Fit?
No, but an all-electric Fit would.
Hybrid Fit? No
They just need to make the Insight a better car. The complaints are that it’s a lousy car, not that it’s a lousy hybrid.
I vote for the Freed… and about $5 billion in drivetrain R&D.
“Not sure what if anything will rescue Honda / Acura. Styling sucks. Quality has tanked. Dealer service/support has gone awol.”
That’s a little harsh, yet…
What happened?
You can see it with Subaru now too… trying to be all mainstream and wanting to be Toyota.
I mean what is it exactly? Is it a vibe or a feeling or the culture or what? Acura style is indeed… not something I would want.
I mean these dudes used to have some pretty good unique cars for the time. Now it’s like it’s all about the mainstream or something. The styling isn’t like how it was…
Hard to describe. At least there is still the SI.
Oh yeah and if I wanted a “green” car, I hear that “diesel” substance is pretty good.
@Gary Numan:
My first and only Honda ownership experience (05 Odyssey) started badly when the car broke in the driveway with only 26 miles on the odometer. It ended 20 horrible months later with a lemon law settlement check in my hand, and a “good riddance” as I traded down for a used Caravan.
My one data point was quite poor, for both product and service.
The Fit is a good car; don’t ruin it by hybridizing it.
Atomicblue :
September 10th, 2009 at 4:11 pm
@ TRL. I like your thinking here. A diesel Fit with Honda Europe’s 2.2 diesel motor would be a Japanese answer to the VW and Audi (A3) diesel offerings and they could do it for a much lower price.
LOL…sorry, but that’s an answer to a market that’s so small that they could all go to the same Phish concert together. Come to think of it, I think that’s EXACTLY what all those VW diesel owners do.
Autosavant
On a leisurly drive around beautiful, scenic Palos Verdes, it got 62 and 69 MPG!!
Don’t be talking up the drive through Palos Verdes. Next thing you know, we’ll be hip deep in gridlock! The fewer people that come here, the better we like it.
Thanks,
The PV Tourist Board
Doubt it. A fit without the flat load floor and “tall mode” just isn’t a fit anymore, and I can’t see where they’d put the batteries. A hybrid Odyssey, perhaps with a bit of a boattail for better aero might, but even then, Toyota can easily respond with something better unless Honda can develop a hybrid system rivaling Toyota’s for efficiency. An S2000 with some electric torque assist below vtec rpm would be cool, though, if weight could be kept down……
Autosavant
On a leisurly drive around beautiful, scenic Palos Verdes, it got 62 and 69 MPG!!
Don’t be talking up the drive through Palos Verdes. Next thing you know, we’ll be hip deep in gridlock! The fewer people that come here, the better we like it.
Thanks,
The PV Tourist Board
LOL. Palos Verdes, a nice quiet neighborhood. I should stop by more often!
But seriously, what improvements could the Civic hybrid incorporate to compete with the Prius? I understand that the Prius’ engine technology for one is in its second generation. Any mechanical improvements Honda might be working on to up the fuel economy and maybe reduce the annoying engine noise? How about design? I’ve noticed lately that the “forward swept” design seen on current generation civics is sometimes indistinguishable from the Prius’. Perhaps they could go back to the drawing board and take a page from other autos by designing a completely new car body, one that’s revolutionary and distinct from other brands’?
It’s telling that I want the dog in the picture more than the car.
Honda should offer the Oddesy with one of the excellent diesel engines available in Honda vehicles sold in Europe. A 35 to 45 mpg minivan would be a game changer.
The Insight hybrid has become a non-car. It doesn’t have the kind of greenie mojo enjoyed by the Prius.
“But seriously…slightly off topic, what improvements could the Civic hybrid incorporate to compete with the Prius?”
It seems Honda made a marketing mistake with its new Insight. They told their engineers to design a cheaper Prius, thinking they would grab the slice of the hybrid market which can’t afford a Prius. It turned out it is a small slice, since there are many non-hybrids and diesels that are just as good, if not better, than the insight, and frequently for less. How many people will be better off buying an Insight vs a regular Civic? Do you know even one? I do not. (I know one who bought a new Insight, he paid about $20k, but I don’t know why he bought it, if he shopped around, etc)
” I understand that the Prius’ engine technology for one is in its second generation. Any mechanical improvements Honda might be working on to up the fuel economy and maybe reduce the annoying engine noise?”
The Insight might look like th ePrius, but even the 2nd Gen pRius is an amazing tech feat. The car is purposely designed to maximize MPG, and 35 and 40 mpg are NOT serious numbers, one must get 50 and 60 for a Prius sized hybrid to make a difference and attract attention. Every square inch of the prius has been studied and optimized to minimize drag, see the slight curves of the roof etc. I doubt the Insight has all that r&D behind it, after all they did no thave the years the Prius engineers had, the Honda guys had to finish it fast.
And sure, each hybrid MUST look different than a non-hybrid. The owner paid an arm and a leg for it, and he or she does not want to have to explain to anybody that they drive a hybrid. What is the point of buying an S-class that looks just like the $20k cheaper E-class?
I think a diesel Fit would do pretty well. VW has pretty much sold out of 2009 Jetta TDIs. If they could also offer AWD like they did on old Civic wagons, that would be even better. There are a lot of VW owners that like the TDI engine, but don’t like much else about VW and would gladly buy a diesel Honda. It’d definitely get attention if they marketed it properly.
DisturbedDriver :
September 11th, 2009 at 4:30 am
But seriously, what improvements could the Civic hybrid incorporate to compete with the Prius?
I think the Insight is designed to sell at a lower price point than the Prius; thus, the mechanicals are going to be somewhat inferior by definition.
However, one glaring difference between these two cars is in the interior: the Prius has it all over the Honda in terms of styling and materials quality. An immediate upgrade here would probably net Honda some sales.
Just because Toyota jumps off a cliff doesn’t mean Honda has to do it too.
Honda’s forte has always been simple cars whose efficiency is built-in, as opposed to bolted-on. They should stick to their strengths, and let Toyota stake its future on the hybrid fad.
Just because Toyota jumps off a cliff doesn’t mean Honda has to do it too.
Honda’s forte has always been simple cars whose efficiency is built-in, as opposed to bolted-on. They should stick to their strengths, and let Toyota stake its future on the hybrid fad.
And just let them dominate the hybrid market? We all know that though most people few years from now will still be buying pure gasoline combustion engines, that doesn’t mean Honda should stick to pure combustion engines only. That would give Toyota free reign to price their current and future Priuses as they wished. Believe me, Toyota isn’t the only company that can create decent hybrids.
As the market for hybrids grows steadily, the market for pure combustion engines will shrink. Even though we may eventually convert to hydrogen-based engines, one cannot deny that the hybrid car market is a profitable one that the car companies can’t afford to ignore.
Plus we can’t just assume that Honda simply isn’t able to make a marketable hybrid.
It’s just like saying Sony should stick to making LCDs, and Panasonic to making Plasmas, and just let Samsung make the high margin expensive LED backlit TVs on top of their huge dominance in the LCD TV market. That may work in the short 3-year term, but as prices come down, people can and will perceive the LED backlit TV as an attractive alternative. As Samsung continues to maintain or even increase its marketshare, Sony and Panasonic would find that their LCD marketshare, their main cash cows are shrinking as customers migrate to LED backlit TVs. They would be hard-pressed to enter a new profitable market for LED backlit TVs already dominated by Samsung. With Samsung already having assembly lines and patent portfolios for LED backlit technology in their possession, Sony and Panasonic would have to waste away years trying to gain both while making a profit.
The same goes with the hybrid market. Even if the Civic hybrid doesn’t sell well, the design and technological know-how gained from all that R&D funding will eventually wash over into the manufacture of future generations of Honda hybrids.
Let’s face the reality. Pure combustion engine potential will at some point wane out as manufacturers approach the point of diminishing returns. At some point, it’ll be hard to compete with hybrid engine/battery combos that can easily pump out 50+mpg using the combustion technology we have now. Even if we phase out hybrid technology in 20 years, the benefits from selling cars with that technology could still benefit the manufacturer should it decide to use its battery making know-how to make a pure electric car.
So once again, I don’t think it’s wise to simply assume Honda simply can’t compete with Toyota in this arena. Sure, it flopped on the design and engine technology. Even worse, Toyota has the advantage of being the more established brand in the field of hybrids. But that doesn’t mean other car companies should stick solely to their niche, whatever it is. The likes of Honda, Hyundai, Ford, GM, and Nissan can’t just stick to being one trick ponies. Eventually the crowds will want to see more and will move onto the next attraction when they get bored.
Just as Toyota was able to shed its image as purely a puny sedan maker and make wide inroads into the truck market with the Tundra, Honda needs to find a way to establish itself as a manufacturer of super fuel-efficient hybrids. It needs to look at a shift in the paradigm in terms of design and how it gets marketed to customers. Honda will most likely have to achieve this through some marketing scheme that differentiates a future Honda hybrid completely from the Prius.
And just let them dominate the hybrid market?
Why not? They let Ford dominate the truck market, and Q-Tip dominate the ear-cleaning market. Can’t be everything to all people.
As the market for hybrids grows steadily, the market for pure combustion engines will shrink.
I believe Disco Stu offered the same analysis of disco album sales, based on 1975-1977 trends. I will believe this when I see it.
Cost structure is such that in 20 years time all except the cheapest ICE cars will be hybrid. It just has to do with the price difference between a pure ICE and a hybrid which is quite small. It is in fact so small that governments will tax cars into hybridship.
I believe Disco Stu offered the same analysis of disco album sales, based on 1975-1977 trends. I will believe this when I see it.
Yes, and the same was said of the Boeing 7E7 (later renamed the 787) by the likes of Airbus/EADS when it was first announced.
I have (had) been a long time fan of Honda. I have owned a total of 4 Hondas over a course of 17 years. When it was time to trade our last Honda this year, I looked to, well, Honda, and Acura. But there wasn’t a single model in their line up that a. suites my needs b. appeals to me. I had come to the realisation that Honda is making “different” cars these days than what they used to. But are they completely off their mark as to what North Americans actually want for their rides? What ever happened to their oft touted “quality”? Ultimately, though, the single deciding factor that turned me away from Honda was …….. the head rest. That front leaning head rest is a killer on my upper back.
Seriously, Honda need to re-examine their overall design direction to be more in tune what most of us like, not what Honda wants us to like. Case in point – the Crosstour.
Honda’s forte has always been simple cars whose efficiency is built-in, as opposed to bolted-on. They should stick to their strengths, and let Toyota stake its future on the hybrid fad.
First generation Honda Insight on line 1.
“Honda’s forte has always been simple cars whose efficiency is built-in, as opposed to bolted-on. They should stick to their strengths, and let Toyota stake its future on the hybrid fad. ”
Very well said. I second that.
I owned an 1990 Accord coupe 5-speed for 14 yrs before donating it to charity with 137k hard-driven stop-go cold start miles at 18 yrs old, and we still own a 91 civic hatch with very low miles that easily gets 44 highway and 35 overall.
The new Insight is only marginally better and does not justify the price premium. it is 10 MPG below the Prius in most tests.
Unless Honda can do what it could always do, make a PRius foghter with high-quality materials AND BETTER, not 10 MPG WORSE, MPG