Curiosity Addressed: Sales, Owners & More

Erica (and the rest of Team Prius),

Thanks for these facts, as they are very interesting. My comment for the moment will be only on the one mentioned above.

Would it be fair to say then, that the percentage of folks buying a Hybrid for the first tie is falling? I imagine that when the first Gen I car was sold it was sold to a first time hybrid buyer. The same is probably true of the early Gen II sales. If so, then it would seem that the "Whopping" 75% of first time hybrid buyers is likely much lower than the ratio of those early buyers...

Either way, it is clear to us that you have succeeded in making a great car even better! Thanks for the insight! This may quiet a few folks concerns about where the buyers are coming from.

 

Erica,

Thank you for sharing this info with us. It's very informative and a fun way to know what's going on in the Prius family!

Bryan

 

30,000 new hybrid owners in 3 months! That's amazing and I'm one of them.

 

I'm also one of the first-time hybrid buyers (or will be once my III makes its way to the dealership from Newark).

I would have liked to have been a SR owner, but the cursed regional dealers decided that we had to upgrade to the IV in order to get that option.

 

Thank you. I am one of the male, marginally younger (I don't feel young), and first time hybrid owner - call me one of the sheep, LOL.

I look at your participation and posts here as value added to my Prius purchase - I always like getting the info from the source.

 

I think it would have been very progressive to offer these features on any trim level Prius. I've seen Toyota presentations on these systems for a few years at traffic safety conferences and was encouraged when I read that they would be available on a non-luxury class vehicle. I would have happily paid for this package if I didn't have to buy all sorts of other stuff I didn't want. While I understand that cost prevents them from being standard across the line, I am quite disappointed that they were not available a la carte.

Incidentally, we are also first time hybrid buyers. My wife is the primary driver.

 

I think it's clear that the updated design and the new features have made the Gen 3 Prius very desirable to a wider group of people. Now you don't have to sacrifice the goodies for maximum fuel effieciency - you can get great MPG, AND a sporty look AND cool features! What's not to love?

I'm very happy to be a new member of the hybrid movement!!

 

Awesome info.
Thanks for that!

 

hi im only 29 dont call me old.....LOL interesting stats

 

Even if that happens, people would still have to decide between Advanced Technology package and Solar Roof due to weight issues.

 

+1 on everything from Maggie.

If you were to tell me last year that I'd be a Prius owner now, I'd question what you're smokin'.

The 2010 is not your father's Oldsmo.... Prius.

 

I'm surprised the top 3 selling colors are White, Silver and Winter Grey (as opposed to "richer" colors like Red and Blue). That said, it does this Winter Grey Prius owner proud to see us in the Top 3. It's also not surprising to see the Prius II claim a third of the sales.

 

Those numbers are really only meaningful if there are enough of each model and package combination to meet demand. While you say that 1/3 of all sales are Prius II's, there are many sitting on lots, but almost no Prius V's. Those sales percentages are of course limited by the number of each package available for sale--you can't sell 5,000 Prius V with Advance Tech if only 1,200 are available. As such, people do not necessarily buy the model or color desired but instead walk away with something in stock.

By making lots of one model and few of other models, I think what we see is a kind of positive feedback going to some models (like Prius II) due to limited availability of other models. A better measure of popularity might be the sold percentage of each model and package delivered to dealers. I bet that Prius V with ATP and Prius V with SR would top the list at near 100%. That would tell me to build more of those!!

 

Yep. OPEC pooped in their mess kit when they got prices so high that forced people to look at Prius. Now even though gas prices are back down, people already know that "Hey, this is a nice car". And so does everyone of their friends and relatives and co-workers that ride with them, so the word spreads exponentially. Glad to see it.

 

First time buyer here and have to say that the Prius reputation and market dominance made it a no brainer for us to go this route. The price of gas nudged us in this direction but the Prius tech-ness made us believers.

 

I am not surprised about the top 3, except that in the NW, winter grey lagged way behind. When I checked (call and web) about 50 dealers in OR, WA, ID, originally looking for SBM, and then blue, at least 3 out of 5 cars posted on the dealer web pages were silver, followed by Pearl. I could page through 50 cars before I found SBM, blue, or black. A few more red and grey. Also, as for CA outselling other states, again no surprise since their allocations were huge compared to the 3 state NW; and in turn were selling many II and III below MSRP whereas no one up here was. I did not go down, due to sales tax issues vs flatbedding. In hindsight it would have been better to have used Diane and shipped it back. I joined the site too late to find her!