Featured Reports of Prius death have been greatly exaggerated

Discussion in 'Prius, Hybrid, EV and Alt-Fuel News' started by bwilson4web, Jan 24, 2017.

  1. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    Source: http://wardsauto.com/industry/toyota-down-sales-prius-upside-rav4-hybrid

    DETROIT – Toyota is calling for 75,000 sales of its Prius liftback variant in 2017, 23,866 fewer than it sold in 2016.

    The reason? Weak market demand for hybrid cars.

    “We’re going to follow the market, but we think we have the supply-and-demand (equation) pretty much dialed in,” Bob Carter, senior vice president-automotive operations for Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A. tells WardsAuto in an interview here.
    . . .
    Toyota sold 98,866 Prius liftbacks last year in the U.S., down 12.9%. The 5-year-old Prius V wagon and Prius C compact hatchback fell 47.4% and 46.7%, respectively, to 14,840 and 20,452, while sales of the Prius plug-in hybrid were down 40.8% to 2,474.
    . . .
    Overall you’ll see our volumes come in similar this year to last year, but the mix will continue to evolve (toward light trucks vs. cars),” Carter says. “I don’t think the movement to light trucks and CUVs is over, but the rate of growth will slow.”

    [email protected]
    ​
    1. The 2016 Prius Level 2 ECO did not have TSS-P option - so I could NOT be tempted by a a Level 3, moonroof.
    2. Local dealer could not tempt me to buy a Prius Prime Advanced.
    The Prius Prime, certainly the lowest trim Plus we own, is to all previous Prius, an amazing vehicle and I've owned the Gen-1 and Gen-3. I do not care if others choose another but our Prius Prime Plus is f*ckin' awesome. For example, I drove a 2016 Prius Level 3 with TSS-P on a local loop and barely reached 90 MPG. Yesterday, our 2017 Prius Prime 2017 did 10.5 miles @28 mph and achieved 105.5 MPG.

    We've not seen mileage like this since: Compare Side-by-Side

    Only the Prius Prime Plus will carry four people and the 2001 Insight, just two.

    Bob Wilson
     
    #1 bwilson4web, Jan 24, 2017
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  2. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    the patient is in an induced coma, waiting for opec to get it's act together. see me in 2022.
     
    #2 bisco, Jan 24, 2017
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  3. Trollbait

    Trollbait It's a D&D thing

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    Prius sales were hindered by the sales stop for the parking brake recall.

    If high gas prices are still required, I don't have much hope for the Liftback expanding much beyond the 100k a year mark
     
    #3 Trollbait, Jan 24, 2017
  4. ETC(SS)

    ETC(SS) The OTHER One Percenter.....

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    I still don't understand why people feel that it's smarter to waste $2 gas than it is to waste $4 gas.

    Granted...I'm not down with all of the bunny-hugging crap, but if I'm commuting more than my current three miles, then economy slides further to the left on the scale of importance in new car features.

    Gas has been through several boom and bust cycles in the nearly 20 years that Priuses have been sold, and there was a 12-percent drop last year in the number of units sold.
    That's nearly 20,000 units.
    You can lie with numbers....but MY opinion (current street price $0.02) is that part of that drop lies outside of the fact that gas is currently cheaper than some people want it to be.

    You can blame many things, and there's a LOT of likely candidates.
    It's like saying brown, brown, medium, medium to a cop.(brown hair, Brown eyes, medium height, medium build.)

    It could be MANY things.
    Over saturation in new car financing.
    The Economy.
    The parking brake.
    Pricing.
    Styling.
    The fact that previous generations of Priuses are lasting a looooooooong time and the target demographic isn't into swapping out cars every four years.

    Or?
    Unlike the crime shows where it has to be ONE suspect, maybe.......juuuuuust maybe this was a team effort.

    Yeah.
    I know.
    It's more comforting to just blame cheap gas. ;)
     
    #4 ETC(SS), Jan 24, 2017
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  5. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    i don't have any hope. at least for the next 5 years.
     
    #5 bisco, Jan 24, 2017
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  6. paprius4030

    paprius4030 My first Prius

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    You think it will be re-styled in 5 years? I hope mine makes it. I really dislike the looks of the Gen4.
     
    #6 paprius4030, Jan 24, 2017
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  7. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    6 total, but 5 from now. they always do, no reason to think otherwise, although, the gen 3 didn't fall that far from the tree.
     
    #7 bisco, Jan 24, 2017
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  8. paprius4030

    paprius4030 My first Prius

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    I was hoping they world re-style it NEXT year LOL
     
    #8 paprius4030, Jan 24, 2017
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  9. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    you and a lot of others. careful what you wish for.:p
     
    #9 bisco, Jan 24, 2017
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  10. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    Another source from July 7, 2016: http://wardsauto.com/engines/prius-best-days-rearview-mirror

    At one time Toyota thought the Prius hybrid could be as big a seller as the Camry midsize sedan, which traditionally racks up more than 400,000 annual sales in the U.S.

    In the near-term, the automaker thought it could increase U.S. sales of the car 30%.

    But if this year’s performance of the new fourth-generation Prius sedan is any indication, neither of those predictions may come true.
    . . .    ​

    First off, I'm not in the business of 'blowing smoke' and I agree Prius sales are soft but in no small part because of poor decisions Toyota USA and Toyota Corporate are making. For example, I turned down an offer in May for a 2016 Prius because it did not have enough 'value added engineering', rear wheel drive, tow package, and 1.5kW AC inverter, and was the same price as the used 2014 BMW i3-REx sitting in my driveway. The deal killer was middling MPG, forcing a useless moonroof, and lack of TSS-P.

    This morning I chose to drive our 2014 BMW i3-REx to work instead of our 2017 Prius Prime because the local cold spell, no warmer than 60F, there was nothing to learn. So I drove the BMW i3-REx to Decatur for brunch including running the REx so I can empty the spare can into the tank in the morning. I also tested an iPhone USB-to-Lightning cable which worked.

    Yes Toyota had a parking brake problem and suspended sales in the Fall but if it weren't for PriusChat we would not have heard about it. It certainly was not found in the Toyota Newsroom. I am reminded of the same 'somnolent' attitude found in the local, Toyota sales force. We bought a 2017 Prius Prime in spite of, not because of, the local sales critters.

    Regardless, there are Prius skeptics who take every opportunity to run down our ride. For those, "I'll meet you at the pump." . . .

    Bob Wilson
     
    #10 bwilson4web, Jan 24, 2017
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  11. Felt

    Felt Senior Member

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    The price of gasoline may fluctuate ..... but the added taxes will always go up. Gov. Brown (California) just signed a large tax increase on each gallon of gas.
     
    #11 Felt, Jan 25, 2017
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  12. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    that's why cali is such an anomaly.
     
    #12 bisco, Jan 25, 2017
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  13. Zythryn

    Zythryn Senior Member

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    Very true. I have seen almost no other increases to the gas tax, even though it hasn't increased in years or decades.
     
    #13 Zythryn, Jan 25, 2017
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  14. ETC(SS)

    ETC(SS) The OTHER One Percenter.....

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    Toyota Prius - Wikipedia

    There's sales data in the wiki page that can be stretched this way and that way.
    I was going to fill a page with rubber-chicken graphs and tables, but others have already plowed that field, and the data on the G4/Prime are still inbound.

    Death?
    No.....but there's a LOT of competition out there and the Prius will either be regarded as an iPhone or a Blackberry in 10 years.

    As always....the market will decide that.
     
    #14 ETC(SS), Jan 25, 2017
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  15. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    No doubt some automotive reporter in a walker will wander up to a Prius and whack it with their cane,"Why didn't you die?"

    Bob Wilson
     
    #15 bwilson4web, Jan 25, 2017
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  16. ETC(SS)

    ETC(SS) The OTHER One Percenter.....

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    Cars are getting more intelligent.

    Some day they might be able to hit back.
     
    #16 ETC(SS), Jan 26, 2017
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  17. Ashlem

    Ashlem Senior Member

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    Well, I'm glad Toyota's softened their stance on plug-in cars at least. It really turned me off from their cars when they kept bashing them, claiming "nobody wants electric cars", and taking forever to release what became the Prius Prime.

    I'm sure the continued growth in sales for plug-in cars worldwide, the poor reception for the Mirai fuel cell vehicle, and likely the nearly 400k reservations for the Tesla Model 3 at $1k each likely showed them that people will buy electric cars, if you would actually build them.

    Definitely interested to see what'll happen to the Prius v and c though. They haven't gotten a redesign yet, have they? And I heard the v in particular is suffering because of the Rav4 hybrid. So if true, I hope they make it stand out more, lets the Rav4 eats into more v sales.
     
    #17 Ashlem, Jan 26, 2017
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  18. Trollbait

    Trollbait It's a D&D thing

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    The Prius c will need a price reduction to continue on. Efficiency can go up, but I think lower price is more important in that segment.

    The v will have a tough go at it. Between the Corolla iM and the Rav4, I think it will need a bigger improvement in efficiency than the gen4 saw in order to stand out. If the light weighting and power boost of the gen4 was enough, Toyota might get it be eliminating the reduction gear the current v has.
     
    #18 Trollbait, Jan 27, 2017
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