I'm in so. Ca and i can't find a New 2022 Prius Prime XLE. When i did the salesman told me it was go

Decided on the day Russia invaded the Ukrain that it was time to act on my long time desire to own a Prius Prime. The financial aspects of it were making more sense now. I pulled up all of he XLE models I could find within a 500 mile radius of my home. There weren’t many. I started calling dealers that had any listed on Autotrader. Most responses were, oh sorry that sold already. (Wish they wouldn’t leave them advertised long after they were sold). After many calls I finally found one in the Buffalo NY area about 350 miles from me. I immediately put a deposit on it and essentially bought the car over the phone and by overnight deliveries of paperwork. I flew to NY and the car was ready and waiting for me to drive away. I was probably only at the dealer for 10 to 15 minutes before I was on the road to get home. Got 62 mpg on the trip home and I’ve been home with it almost two weeks and haven’t used a drop of gas since getting it home! We’ve driven it everyday but all trips were under the 25 miles EV range.

But yes, I expect they are getting harder to find. I know with gas already high before the Ukrainian invasion we would see prices thru the roof. Also I learned that the Federal Tax credit was close to being phased out. Obviously if you can get your hands on a new one, buy it! The used ones are selling for more that new! Fortunately I didn’t have to pay any markup and got a $1500 rebate off the sticker price as well as qualify for the $4500 federal credit on next years taxes.

 

I don't think it's allocation. I believe the order goes to Toyota.

 

You can believe that but the fact is its likely just an allocation. See this ask a salesman post from 3 years ago when things were "normal"

What you "ordered" isn't speical in the sense that toyota is making many of that configuration....its just a matter of when that region / dealer will be able to snag it for you

 

If the dealers don't order any cars, they don't get any cars. He simply put an order with Toyota for my specific car, and Toyota will eventually ship it to them. Let's see how this works out or doesn't. I will provide updates.

 

My local dealer (Palm Springs, CA) Toyota of the Desert has three of them as of today, 3/25/22

https://www.toyotaofthedesert.com/new-vehicles/prius-prime/

 

lol, Barnum was right

 

Regarding if Toyota actually makes a car on demand—that I don't know and it's somewhat a moot issue. However, when the car I ordered becomes available, Toyota will ship it to my dealer. Moreover, I won't be charged a markup. Hopefully, it won't take too long and/or we'll get another three months of full $4,502 federal tax credit.

 

Well, I will attend at least the first half of this to see how this ordering process works.

 

Seems like this is a new Toyota thing:
https://www.autoevolution.com/news/toyotas-project-eta-will-help-customers-keep-track-of-the-vehicles-they-ordered-183452.html
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Toyota’s Project ETA Will Help Customers Keep Track of the Vehicles They Ordered
8 Mar 2022, 17:11 UTC · by Cristian Agatie

Buying a new car is supposed to be one of the most exciting experiences and rightly so considering the amount of money involved. And yet, somehow, after the order is placed, everything is shrouded in mystery and there’s little you can do until the dealer calls you to tell you that your car has arrived. Toyota vows to offer more insight to its customers in the U.S. from the moment the car rolls off the production line and to the moment it gets on the dealer lot.

Many people buy their new vehicles online these days, most of the time without even seeing them. This strips away a great deal from the whole ordering process, but the hard part only now begins. It’s that part from the moment you get your VIN and the moment the dealer calls with the exciting news your ride awaits you. Especially in the past months, this also involves painfully long waiting times when no one tells you where is your car and when it will get to you. That’s when the dealer does not want to mark up the vehicle you ordered because he knows it’s in high demand.

Well, some carmakers thought about this ordeal their customers are facing and came up with some clever solutions. After General Motors started testing a new order tracking system with Corvette customers, we learned Toyota will launch a similar program in about a week.

The “Project ETA” will arrive at Toyota and Lexus dealerships in the U.S. this summer, after being introduced at a dealer’s meeting next week.

Project ETA, as its name suggests, will help locate the cars in the intricate logistics chain of the automaker and will provide estimates about the delivery date. According to Keith Robertson, group vice president for supply chain management at Toyota Motor North America, the new system should improve the transparency of where a vehicle is in the delivery process. It will also provide timely notifications to dealers when there is a delay.

“It would be great to have some transparency so that we could tell a customer that their vehicle was going to be here in two weeks, or 10 days, or four months, whatever, but be able to update them when something changes,” explains for Automotive News Danny Wilson, head of the Toyota National Dealer Advisory Council.

More like a delivery smartphone app, the Project ETA will offer a graphical representation of where a vehicle is in the production or delivery process. The delays would also be communicated through this system and alerts can be set for various steps in the delivery process. This is of great help to the dealers, allowing them to offer meaningful information to customers when asked.
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Fwiw, even back in the 70's, GM provided dealerships with multiple updates each week - down to where the vehicle was in the assembly/shipping process (many cars are produced a day, but it takes many days from start to finish).
More info from a quick google search:
https://jvis.us/2018/05/10/how-long-does-it-take-automakers-to-build-a-car/
How Long Does It Take To Get A New Car From A Dealership?

 

It's pretty complicated logistics the way these orders are processed by Toyota. This screenshot is from the webinar earlier.

 

Yup. I flew to PHX to buy my white one and to OKC to buy the red one. Drove them both home.

 

Toyota supply-chain problems, vehicle-order process and logistics, the new bZ4X, etc. are explained. Hybrid and electric vehicles are very hard to get these days, and placing an order with a deposit and waiting for several months is the only way.

 

AWESOME video, with direct information.
THANKS!

As the video implied, different dealerships get different allotments for different vehicles.
And, different vehicles have different waiting lists.
It varies for each dealership, and the exact vehicle, color, model, packages(none available on any PiP model), that a person wants.
So, no "one answer fits all".

Thanks again!!

 

That still seems to indicate that dealers aren't really 'ordering' a vehicle from the factory but checking what is allocated and wheeling and dealing amongst themselves to get what the buyer has requested sent to them.

 

Note that the allocation is done before the car is built. So, I don't know if Toyota actually considers the orders before they build cars.

We could know in a few days or will know by the end of this month latest if the federal tax credit will start sunsetting on July 1 or October 1, 2022.

 

For all, see thread:
May have reached 200k | PriusChat

 

Here is the full video.

 

THANKS!!!

There is a ton of useful information in that video.
Fwiw, I suggest that people watch it at 2x-speed. The video is 1:50 long. The people talk clearly enough and the audio is good, so that there's no problem understanding them at 2x speed.

 

There are a lot of Priuses and Prius Primes available in Sothern California now. Either Toyota is overcoming the supply-chain problems or the demand is falling because of the current economic crisis.