I know this is new and exciting, but this is also the third thread started on the subject today:

Prius tops Consumer Reports best value list by Cacti in mid-afternoon. Before that:

09 Pri is Consumer Reports Top Pick by EZW1, just a bit earlier this afternoon.

There also is the earlier thread on the 2009’s Consumer Report’s rating started by hill in December:
2009 Prius: Consumer Report Rating

Don't mean to be too snippy, but it is hard to follow all thoughts on the subject when there are so many threads started at the same time.

Appreciate the concerns. EZW1's thread was regarding a different article, noting that the Prius had been rated as CRs top green car. Hills article had to do with general ratings. This post and Cacti's both deal with the press following CR naming the Prius best overall value. For the most part these are all separate events as far as I can tell, with the exception of Cacti posting a similar news story to mine in the general forum. I posted this in the news forum as this was a news item I had seen. If the mods want to merge the threads thats fine. I hadn't found Cacti's thread, possibly due to working on this post on and off throughout the afternoon at work in an effort to provide some details and analysis.

Rob

What? No TDI from Consumer Reports ??

Absolutly Ludacris

Thanks for the explanation, Rob. I think it would be a good idea to merge the three threads, though. I like your opening summary statements. Thanks for doing the legwork.

The Touring version is hard to get in many parts of the country, and is almost a moot point. For me, the base Prius devoid of any extras except the smart key and the stability option (#2 package) is the best value. The base Prius is plenty good for basic transportation. The brakes and handling are fine.

I'm a subscriber to CR, but I don't always agree with their assessments of cars I have driven. I do pay attention to their reliability feedback, which I have contributed to.

I'm giving Car and Driver a bit more credit these days when they assessed the current Prius being 'big money for a small car'.

Mine was $30.3k otd last Summer during the crunch, so C&D's claim really hits home.

I know ya can't do things over, but I would have done it over with a used Mazda3 5 door for about $18k with tax, and saved the other $13k.

I hope when the 2010 hits the showrooms, people experience what a real driver's seat feels like in a Prius.

Far as I can tell, a $29k touring Prius has the same driver's seat shape, track travel, limited 4-way adjustability and non-telescoping steering wheel of a $16,005 Yaris 5-door liftback.

For me, 2009's a cool car that's let down by a peculiar driver's seat. Tall people beware.

Wonder why the touring is so much more cheaper to drive then the base prius?

??? Percentage of retained value ???

Since I have a Touring...:rockon:

1. Top green car.
2. Top rated.
3. Top value.
Praise stated in a few different ways.

It isn't. The dollar amount listed by the OP is cost of ownership divided by CR test score. The touring gets a higher test score than the base prius so it comes out ahead in CR's new measurement. The Touring will cost you more to operate than a Base Prius.

Consumer Reports has made their own metric to measure car's value. This measurement is only relevant within Consumer Reports.

For example, you take Edmund's Cost to own and divide that cost by Edmunds test scores and get a different list that is only relevant within Edmunds.

^

Exactly.

Much as I (and particularly my wife) enjoy our Prius, I think this "overall value" measure is pretty meaningless. And it's silly of CR to publish it. In fact, as a longtime CR member, I find it embarassing that they did this.

Here's a partial list of the problems with it...

1. The CR road test score is an aggregated index score composed of a variety of different weighted components. The weights they use, which reflect what they value in a car, may be very different from what a particular driver values. In fact, with aggregated index scores of this sort, it's typically possible to adjust the weights to generate a vastly different result.

2. Even if the weights are EXACTLY what a driver values, there's still the question of whether the scale is cardinally correct. For example, is a car with a score of 90 exactly 50% better than one with a score of 60? That's what's assumed, implicitly, by the $/score ratio.

3. Different buyers have different marginal valuations of a dollar versus a better car. Put another the CR value score is pretty useless for someone who has $15k to spend and would have to take out a costly loan to buy a more expensive car. Nor is it very informative for a rich person who wants a great car and isn't very concerned about the price. Even for those of us who fall in between $/score isn't a very useful metric -- it doesn't convey much of anything besides what we can already learn from reading CR road tests for comparable models.

What those road tests show that's relevant to me is that the Prius is a vehicle that's pretty comfortable, highly reliable, and has decent handling, along with nice cargo space for a car of its size, all while getting great gas mileage. That, along with the fact that it's in a price range that I find reasonable is all I need to know to know that it's a great car for me.

A Macintosh owner, we've had to put up with similar claims from the "PC" community since 1985. That along with the Apple is going out of business and a host of patently false claims. We also got to see the newest announced Mac cannibalizing current Mac sales as well as the poor user who just bought one a day before the announcement.

Nothing can undo history (something I realized in Marine bootcamp,) but we can adapt and make the best of what we've got. You're 2009 is a fine hybrid and kicks ass against the current competition. There are things that can be done to make it better or when gas goes over $4/gal this year, figure out how you're going to sell it.

Bob Wilson

Nicely stated. Well done.

The temptation is so great to assign numbers for purposes of comparison. I think it all started when we were asked to assign pain on a scale of 1 to 10.

Truly, when we have gained enough math skills to be dangerous and have spreadsheets in hand, all sorts of damage may be inflicted on guilty and innocent alike. I've been part of it! Linear regression analysis. Multi-variable regressions. They all must be fed by numbers to work, so we feed away. This hardly justifies coming up with numerical rankings based on subjective analyses.

Great post. I love the pain from 1-10 thing.... Having seen my wife in the hospital multiple times it is more then laughable.

As a CR subscriber I've been disappointed with them for a while. They were the first to talk about how Hybrids didn't pay for themselves (all the while comparing the Prius to a Corolla, while not taking into account the proper depreciation figures! They later, much later, and in very fine print admitted their fault....) to now saying that a Touring gets an 82 in their test scores while a base gets a 68.... What a joke. Having driven both this is ridiculous.

Then again, this is the publication that simply can't get enough of VW when it comes to their "track" scores, yet can't really recommend any because of reliability issues.

What a freaking joke.

While you might not appreciate a 1-10 pain scale it is very useful to me to give proper medical care. Were a person is on 1-10 isn't really useful as everyone's pain tolerance is different. What is important is whether a person's pain is increasing or decreasing over time or after treatment is administered. Just like pulse, respiration, and blood pressure it is the trend that is important, not the initial evaluation.

As to the Touring vs the Base Prius score, it is more than just about handling. The Touring adds some other useful features besides the upgraded suspension for only $900.

You haven't read Consumer Reports in a while have you. I was glancing through the 2009 CR Car Guide yesterday in a bookstore and CR now recommends at least the VW Rabbit, GTI, and Jetta. There may have been others but those are the ones I'm sure of. While VW hasn't been more that a niche player in the US, they are the world's 3rd largest automaker and managed to increase their profits in 2008 by 15% over 2007 levels. Not a bad result when everyone else seems to be losing Billions in 2009. They must be doing something right.