Prius: New Age Winner (Article)

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Prius: New Age Winner


December 03, 2003

By Kenn Peters
Staff writer

Under normal conditions, when Motor Trend magazine christens its annual car of the year, it's a good thing for the carmaker. The title usually boosts sales.

But this year is different.

Motor Trend named as its car of the year the hybrid Toyota Prius - and Toyota is already selling more of the 2004 model than it can build.

"When it went on sale in mid-October, we already had 12,000 orders," said Wade Hoyt, public affairs manager for Toyota's Northeast region.

Hoyt said Toyota is making 47,000 Priuses available in the United States for this model year, or 25 percent more than it had projected. Dealers are being allocated cars based on how well they did selling with the first generation Prius.

"Only about 80 percent of dealers handled the previous model," Hoyt said.

Hot spots for the Prius have been the Northwest, southern California and a few areas in New England, he said.

Locally, representatives of Romano Toyota, in Syracuse, and Burdick Toyota, in North Syracuse, who wouldn't allow their names to be used said sales outpace supply.

Even though it can't make enough of the cars available to satisfy customer demand, the Prius has something of a halo effect in Toyota dealerships, said Lindsay Brooke, senior analyst at CSM Worldwide, of Farmington Hills, Mich., a company that does forecasting and analysis for the auto industry.

"It can create a halo buzz across the product line. Whether you're coming in to kick the tires or whatever, it has a subliminal affect whether you're buying a Camry or a Corolla," Brooke said.

The Prius runs on a combination of battery power and a gasoline engine. It is considered a rolling platform of high technology, yet it's priced at $20,000.

Toyota's hybrid powerplant combines a 1.5-liter four-cylinder Atkins Cycle gasoline engine producing 76 horsepower and an electric drive motor producing a maximum 67 horsepower. They are hooked to an electronic continuously variable transmission that does not have fixed gear ratios but provides variable ratios in response to driving conditions. The Prius is front-wheel drive.

Every Prius has traction control, power windows and door locks, heated side mirrors, hill acceleration control, remote

entry, regenerative anti-lock brakes with brake assist and electronic brake distribution, cruise control, air conditioning and AM/FM/CD. More equipment is available in options packages; a fully loaded Prius runs around $23,000.

The 2004 is the second-generation Prius. It is significantly larger and more powerful than the first-generation car, which was introduced in 2001, yet it gets up to 60 miles a gallon in the city, far better mileage than the first car.

Toyota has sold about 70,000 Prius models, and this year it figures to quickly sell all 47,000 that will be available, said Hoyt, the Toyota representative.

Toyota's plans to extend its hybrid technology to the Lexus RX330 and Toyota Highlander crossover utility vehicles within the year, Hoyt said.

The RX330 and Highlander are expected to look very much like they do now, a look that's more conservative than Prius.

Even so, the Prius "doesn't look like a high school science project," said Hoyt.

Motor Trend's annual best car award has clearly not always gone to the best car.

For example, the magazine once gave the award to the Plymouth Volare, the most re-called car in American history. Before that it went to the ill-fated Renault LeCar, a mini car known as the R5 in Europe.

"Both of these cars were a disaster, but the Prius is a very sophisticated car, and I don't think there will be any horror stories in terms of reliability or performance," said Brooke, of CSM Worldwide.