Help! Dealers are denying existence of Prius C 1 or 2 in NorCal

Toyota does not produce the lower models in high volumes, in fact the only reason the 1 even exists is so they can advertise "Starting at $19K". I doubt that you would be able to find one easily, they do the same thing for the liftback - advertise the price for the 1, but they told me that its only available for fleet purchases. Kind of shady if you ask me.

 

If they took a deposit from you for a particular car and then sold your car to someone else, that is just bad business. I would make a complaint either to Toyota itself or to the Better Business Bureau.

 

The Prius C1 sure exists. I was ready to buy one at a dealer about an hours drive from me (East Coast) until I got interested in a C2. Another dealer was even going to do a "swap" at another dealer. It exists, just have to search. If anything, place an order for one that is in transit (on the boat) or will be shipping to the states soon, that is, if you can wait. I waited two weeks for my C2.

 

From my research(bought car 7/3) there's a few dealerships with the C2 in the Bay Area. Sunnyvale, Milpitas, Palo Alto, Redwood City, and Vacaville all showed as having a C2 in stock or in transit on their website(checked on Sunday 7/1). I know I saw a couple C1's in my research but I didn't mark them down. You can check for inventory on the dealer's website and if you find it, email or call them to make sure it's still there.

 

Toyota.. not the dealerships themselves... is being pretty stupid in production and allocations... I haven't seen a package 2 (or even a 1) for the past several weeks (almost 2 months now??)..

and each shipment that has been coming into the Bay Area... they've all been 3 or 4's.

that's not really just the dealership I work with.. it's all of California... and a majority of the west coast region... they're just not shipping a lot of 1's or 2's from overseas over.

dealerships have access to inventory for all the others in the region.. so if they say they can't find one... they're dead serious. obviously they want to make the sale... and if the car doesn't exist, they can't sell it to you... the only other reason would be the other dealership that might have it, isn't willing to give it up for them.

for the most part, i was expecting the sales of package 2's and 3's to be towards the top... however, Toyota's been shipping over more 3&4's.. there's quite a few 4's sitting at the dealership I'm at... only because they're not really selling as fast as the 2 or 3.... (if we even had any 2's.. that is..)

Toyota is probably trying to push the sales numbers for the C3 up a bit.. so they're holding back on the C2 and C1.. but like I said.. it's NOT the dealership's fault... they have some control over what they get... but all they can do is request for certain cars to be delivered.. and there's no promise they'll actually get it.

same thing is happening with the Scion FR-S... I've noticed a large, large number of phone calls for the past several weeks from customers looking to just.. LOOK at one... and there's NOTHING in inventory... even requesting certain colors... nope.. nothing... what we get shipped.. is what we get.. how many? what colors? whatever..

 

Yep. I placed my order through a dealership. Negotiated the whole thing through e-mail and contacted about seven dealerships in an hour radius. I'm surprised that no one has it in your area and cannot even take an order for it. Have you contacted many dealerships?

 

i purchased my C2 like two days after the C's got delivered to the dealerships.... i believe it was in the first shipment.. lol... didn't order one.. just saw the C2 I wanted, and got the paperwork done before it got sold to anyone else.

i believe Toyota stopped taking orders for the C over a month ago... you're just gonna have to settle with talking dealerships and nabbing one that's in transit... (i suppose that's still "ordering".. but yeah.. lol..)

 

FWIW, I bought my 06 Prius from Toyota Sunnyvale and was totally satisfied by the buying experience. I have no hesitation in returning.

I helped a friend buy a new '11 Prius late last year. We also went there but she ended up buying from Piercey as they were more willing to budge on Prius. Experience was ok except the F&I person was very pushy and into psychological tactics/guilt tripping people (like me). My friend's never bought a new car before and unfortunately, I didn't have a chance to prep her going into F&I. :/ Now she knows...

A former coworker of mine had issues w/the PiP ordering process I believe at Toyota Marin. They were clueless. He lives in San Rafael or Marin. Thanks to the Toyota Prius FB page and communications back and forth, he found a PiP dealer that was south of him which was PiP certified (something like that... went thru Danny's process) and that worked out.

hope this helps w/your Prius c search, a little.

 

A gentle reminder: Toyota dealers are separate entities from Toyota USA
and Mother Toyota in Japan. It has to be that way, it's been the law since
the mid-30s.

Individual dealers are associated as regions. My sense is that regions ask for
inventory, and then subdivide what they get to dealers based on some agreed
upon formula. However, Toyota USA allots cars to the regions as per a different
pre-agreed upon formula. So, what the regions request may not match T-USA's
allotment.

In the past, and at least on the East Coast, regions have decided not to ask for,
and are then not alloted, and therefore have none to sell of a particular model.

I know this from personal experience. In late 2007, I decided I had to get a
2008 Touring model. All fine and good but there were none in the Southeast
region because the dealers, acting through their regional association had decided
there wouldn't be sufficient demand for what was then the "premium" model.
The dealers didn't want to talk about it either. One even denied the model was
even being made. They would not discuss having one shipped from another
region.

OK, said I. I got my car in Rhode Island, some 400 miles away.

So, whether or not there there are particular models in your area may
not be a simple matter of supply and demand...

Now, just how many C1s and C2s are being stateside by Mother Toyota
is anybody's guess.

 

looks like our own Dianne has two C1 and one C2 I would give her a call.

SoCal Dianne's Prius c inventory available | PriusChat

 

Los Angeles, CA to Carson Toyota - Google Maps

Only 20.1 miles. I'd bet they'd pick him up at the airport.

Manufacturer wants to sell, buy wants to buy. It should be an easy sale, but you have to go through a dealer. So you need to find the volume sellers who work by moving inventory at a smaller profit instead of trying to maximize profit on each sale. Someone like Dianne, fleet and Internet, is a volume seller. Figure out the cost of fly-and-drive-back and see if she can meet your requirements.

And get that $2,000 deposit back.

 

Wow, just reading all of this makes me happy I found my C3-wmoonroof when I did....what a hassle.

Lovin our C-3!!!

 

I got a C2. My buddy who's a dealer hooked it up!

 

hi. I feel your pain. We were looking at a C2 as well in habanero for a month. No can find one. If you are willing to drive please Call John Key Internet sales manager at Folsom Lake Toyota. 916-355-1500. They took $2k off msrp on my C3. I was in and out in 2 hours. If they don't have John will find it or make a great deal on one in stock. So give him a call, Hell take care of you.

 

Look here, there's a whole bunch of Prius C1s.


New Toyota Prius c - in 94901 Area - on Cars.com

 

To the OP, if you are a member of Costco, go to their website and signup for their program. That's how I got my C3, no hassle and almost $1,000 below MSRP. I had to wait six weeks for it to come from Japan, here in San Diego, at the time, there were a ton of 1's & 2's, but hardly any 3's.

As an aside, on Forbes.com there is an article of the 15 hardest to find new cars. The Prius C is number three with an average national inventory of just nine days of sales. The average for all models is 51 days. No wonder these cars are so hard to find.

 

If they took $2k from me as deposit and then do you like that I'd demand my money back and find another dealer and make a complaint to Toyota corporate. My dealer kept trying to get me to put down a deposit even though I was trading in $10k worth of truck in the deal. I pretty much told them to take their deposit and stick it where the sun don't shine and I had my C-2 in about a week anyway. As well as these things are selling I don't understand the deposit angle. If you back out of the deal there's 10 other people waiting in the wings to buy that car...