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$3.25 per . . . sells a lot of hybrids

Discussion in 'Gen 2 Prius Main Forum' started by bwilson4web, Dec 4, 2007.

  1. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    > . . . the article claims that the Prius costs
    > $3.25 per . . .

    As gas reaches $3.25/gallon, Toyota has been selling more and more Prius:

    16,737 - Nov. 07
    13,158 - Oct. 07
    12,494 - Sep. 07 (last month of Federal tax credit)
    167,010 - Prius sold through Nov. 2007
    115,563 - Prius sold in 2006
    [​IMG]

    Where did the "$3.25 per" come from? Why CNW Marketing, of course, April, 2006 when they claimed a Prius has a lifetime cost of "$3.25 per mile." It looks like CNW Marketing's "Dust-to-Dust" wasn't terribly effective since Prius sales showed no appreciable hit after CNW Marketing's "Dust-to-Dust" came out, a spectacular, marketing failure.

    All it took was for Toyota to deliver enough Prius to meet demand and the sales data has three stellar points showing what happened when Toyota delivered enough Prius to keep up with USA demand.

    Bob Wilson
     
    #1 bwilson4web, Dec 4, 2007
  2. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    $3.25 per mile???????

    Say $25,000 for a mid-trim line Prius;

    If it gets 150,000 miles at 40 mpg and $3 gas, that's $11,250 lifetime gas;

    30 service visits at let's say $200 each averaging in plain oil changes with less-frequent required other maintenance is $6,000;

    And let's just assume you got a lemon and spent another $7,750 (just to make everything a round number) on non-warranty repairs.

    Lifetime cost $50,000 for 150,000 miles of driving comes out to 34 cents per mile. And that's an inflated figure and assumes you dropped it off at a junk yard at the end of those 150,000 miles!!!
     
    #2 daniel, Dec 4, 2007
  3. TORCH

    TORCH New Member

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    Dealers may be selling many Hybrids, but out of the total number of cars on the road, they still are just a couple percentage points. They really aren't saving much of the gas being used, and down the line used/dead Hybrid batteries will show to be more polluting than any normal muscle car over it's life span.
     
    #3 TORCH, Dec 4, 2007
  4. TonyPSchaefer

    TonyPSchaefer Your Friendly Moderator
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    Torch,
    Get ready, you are about to receive a whole bunch of replies. I'll start since I'll probably be the nicest.

    First of all, welcome to PriusChat. We're generally a nice bunch of folks.
    Unfortunately, you've just hit a nerve.

    1. In 1999, there were no hybrids. In 2004, when I bought my Prius, hybrid sales accounted for ONLY 0.5% of all cars sold and GM laughed. The following year, hybrid sales accounted for ONLY 1.0% of all cars sold and people still laughed. In 2006, hybrids accounted for ONLY about 2% of cars sales and people still laughed but not as much. This year, they account for ONLY less than 3% and every major car manufacturer is trying to make a hybrid.

    2. Toyota has proven that the hybrid batteries in the Prius are recyclable. They did this long before the Prius was available in the U.S. since the Prius was sold in Japan prior to coming here.

    There have been numerous reports in the media and countless threads/posts here on PriusChat discussing these topics. I'll let others provide the exact details and hopefully links to where you can read more.

    [Edit:]
    Well crap; I wasted a few minutes of my life responding to this troll before I realized that he's just a troll.
     
    #4 TonyPSchaefer, Dec 4, 2007
  5. JimboK

    JimboK One owner, low mileage

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    What, have you lost your torch ... er, touch? ;) I smelled a troll even before reading your post or checking him (and his buddies) out. C'mon, you gotta lead by example! :p
     
    #5 JimboK, Dec 4, 2007
  6. Rangerdavid

    Rangerdavid Senior Member

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    :eek:

    he he he :D
     
    #6 Rangerdavid, Dec 4, 2007
  7. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    commerical ideas

    No problem, you are using ordinary cost of ownership calculations. This is what real buyers do. But "CNW Marketing" uses "Alice in Wonderland" math, a thing of wonder and horror that involves expenses neither you nor I will ever see assigned to anonymous 3d parties and mileage that bears no relationship to reality.

    The "CNW Marketing" "Dust-to-Dust" report is bogus and pretty well discredited. When you look at Prius sales since it came out, it has been a complete and utter failure. Interestingly, it has done nothing to discredit their fundamental assumption:
    • We only buy Prius cars because we are all environmentalists
    So we continue to see the wrong "green" in the advertising instead of "greenbacks", the one that really counts. As gas exceeds $3/gallon, all those bogus 'payback' analysis are evaporating into the nonsense from which they came. Yet that is the strongest argument for a Prius.

    Commercial idea:
    A gas station is full of big SUVs, pickup trucks and luxury vehicles. Only one pump is empty. A Prius drives up, fills up, and leaves. The passenger looks back and from the front, the driver and passenger are all but doubled over laughing.
    ​
    Commercial idea:
    A kid in a big SUV drives along side a cute girl he knows and asks,"Would you like to go out on a date Friday?" She walks up to a Prius with a guy driver and as she gets in, she says,"No thanks, Bill is taking me for a data and dinner Friday night."
    ​
    Commercial idea:
    A good ol' boy in a pickup truck comes up behind a Prius and the driver turns to his buddy and says,"Watch this you leaf looker!" and zooms past and over a hill. The camera stays on the Prius and as it tops the hill, there is the pickup truck with the driver holding out his thumb and a gas can. The Prius stops and the good ol' boy says,"Can I get a lift to the gas station." As they drive off, the good ol' boy asks,"Could I borrow some gas cash?"
    ​
    Bob Wilson
     
    #7 bwilson4web, Dec 4, 2007
  8. Li-Ralph

    Li-Ralph New Member

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    Here in Norway (and most of Europe) a gallon of gasoline costs 7,75 USD. I wonder how the sale chart in USA would look like with these prices. At current time 3 out of 4 new cars sold here is diesel powered. Even wih these fuel prices the Prius (and other hybrid cars) has a market share of just 1 %.
     
    #8 Li-Ralph, Dec 20, 2007
  9. Rae Vynn

    Rae Vynn Artist In Residence

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    What is the price for a gallon of diesel?
    Do most of the diesel cars get at least 45-50 mpg?

    I used to have a diesel VW dasher, years ago... 1.2 L engine (tiny little thing!) and it got fabulous mileage... however, it just SCREAMED when I tried to go 60 mph in it. Best mileage was at 50 mph (sound familiar?)... once, I got 63 mpg in it on a long highway trip.

    However, diesels have the whole dirty exhaust issue (yes, it's a pun, deal), which I'm glad I'm not contributing to anymore.

    Okay, THAT was just a ramble for me... I'm apparently in a verbally rambly mood.
     
    #9 Rae Vynn, Dec 20, 2007
  10. Li-Ralph

    Li-Ralph New Member

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    The diesel costs 5 - 10 % less than gasoline. You get about the same milage as a Prius with a diesel powered Smart 4-2, Mini or a VW Polo, but these cars is very small and only good as a second car or for batchelors.
     
    #10 Li-Ralph, Dec 20, 2007
  11. nerfer

    nerfer A young senior member

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    Hey Tony, you should read this post somebody wrote up on how to identify a troll:
    http://priuschat.com/forums/showthread.php?t=25749&highlight=identify+troll


    Don't get me started on the CNW numbers. That $3.25/mile assumes 109K miles per Prius. The basic premise is that energy=cost, but somehow building a car takes orders of magnitude more energy than you pay for, and that junking a car at the end of its life again takes considerably more energy that you don't have to pay for (and somehow, junk dealers often pay YOU for the priviledge of them spending all this energy but still don't go out of business). Also, I bet that's from the 2005 report, not the universally ignored 2006 follow-up report they made that shows the Prius actually does cost less per mile than large SUVs.
     
    #11 nerfer, Dec 20, 2007
  12. nerfer

    nerfer A young senior member

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    Diesel cost depends on taxes. It used to be cheaper here too, but it's not a bargain anymore. Also, keep in mind that diesel fuel contains something like 25% more hydrocarbons per volume (gallon, liter), so it should go 25% farther per unit volume than a gas-powered vehicle on that fact alone.
     
    #12 nerfer, Dec 20, 2007
  13. nerfer

    nerfer A young senior member

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    Did I miss something here? What article are you quoting?
     
    #13 nerfer, Dec 20, 2007
  14. Earthling

    Earthling New Member

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    Yeah, Tony, a post count of 1 is a clue!

    Harry
     
    #14 Earthling, Dec 20, 2007
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