May 2014 - Hybrid Dashboard Report (last quarter)

beautiful! thanks bob. (and danny)

 

great month! how are we doing cumulatively compared to '13?

 

i keep thinking gas prices are stable. but i haven't filled up since february 18th, so, i'm even more clueless than usual.

 

Hybrids are down 9.3% while autos in general are up 4.8%. Even including plug-ins that are growing faster than the car market, hybrids+plug-ins are still down.

Of the top 10 hybrids that sold last year, 7 were down year on year, with only the fusion, sonata, and lexus ct200h are doing better than last year.

 

Are those sales numbers for each model for the entire US per month or am I reading it wrong?

 

i think you're reading it right.

 

thanks, that's my feeling, just looking around. don't know about the rest of the country, but gas is $3.85 here, unemployment is low, we're making a killing in the market, money is cheap, credit is plentiful, everyone's aboard the o'bama train, life is good! why drive a hybrid, when there are so many comfy suv's to be had?

 

^^^Yes each month in US

Keep in mind May was a huge month for all US car sales, looks like we're heading to over 16 million sold projected for end of 2014, which is super.

The plug-in story so far in 2014 is a California story, I am calculating well over 50% Plug_ins sold in CA for first quarter. Looks like Dianne still has quite a few PiP's with green HOV stickers, so the CA HOV impact wil be felt thru June (first half 2014). Around mid-August we can calculate % plug-ins sold in CA for first half 2014.

 

Hey bisco,
We probably have a few things going on. The prius is getting fairly long in the tooth and people may be putting off purchase until the redesign. People bought on the gas price spike, and their likely is a not very much hybrid momentum right now. Plug-ins are growing fast still, not the 100% we saw last year, but around 30%, and that is reduced by the gm's taint of safety probably hurting the volt, and tesla exporting so fast that they simply don't have enough inventory to sell in the US. Check back after the prius and volt redesigns and hybrid + plug-in should be growing again even if gas goes down to $3/gallon.

BTW - I'll be flying into boston for a wedding on Saturday. I'll be bringing you some texas weather for the weekend.

 

Honda kinda sucks

 

Thanks for linking to Autoline..... I didn't realize they had a non-youtube site. (And yes the white-haired guy is very negative about Priuses and electric cars: "We've been saying for awhile that electrics will lose money for companies.")

 

Toyota Prius Hybirds and plug-ins are looking a lots better!!
Could it be the gas prices?
Could it be the move to Texas?
How many Prius were sold in Texas, over the last several months?
Could the move really help Toyota in sells, overall?

 

Yes all of toyota's north american pick ups, tunda and tacoma, are now made in San Antonio. Moving Tacoma production there from NUMMI, was one reason NUMMI closed. NUMMI was Toyota's most expensive north american plant, and IIRC the 2nd most expensive in the world. San Antonio is one of Toyota's least expensive plants per value added, and one of the most profitable. I doubt the move to texas was to help fix the Texas plant, but perhaps it is to help learn from its sucess, to help make its other plants more profitble. Toyota's headquarters near its worst plant certainly did not help it improve its worst plant. In fact part of the study about what was going wrong at north american headquarters is that they were dictating bad policies to the plants instead of listening to the engineers there.

Texas and Florida are number 2 and 3, can't remember which order, in buying hybrids in the country. Gulf States Toyota is managed by a billionare in Texas, and he is one of those leading the dealer charge against Tesla.

I do know a couple of people that bought toyota trucks because they are made locally. I have a couple of friends at the plant, and it is running at full speed. It is a shame that the prius is not made in north america, as I think that would help. I doubt moving headquarters to texas will sell anymore hybrids in state, as the state already buys a lot. Building better hybrids will increase sales in all states. Hopefully moving headquarters closer to the good plants, will change the culture, and might improve management.

These guys need to get onto planes to visit dealers and plants. Cincinati probably would have also been a good choice, but Texas gave toyota money to move, something that I doubt Ohio could match. DFW is a better airport, although I hate it, and not having an individual state income tax means pay goes farther. I don't think my state should have paid toyota to move here, we have to many californians moving to texas as it is.

 

This has been my experience in the corporate world. The bean counters are running the companies with no desire to hear from the engineers.

 

Toyota plug ins were up a great deal in may. We know one reason why now.
Single Toyota Dealer Sells 1/4 Of All Toyota RAV4 EVs

​

Great job Diane!

​

 

^^^also 1st quarter 2014, I calculated 59% of PHEV were sold in CA. I think that probably means 2/3rds of PiP's were sold in CA. And I think we know who sold most of them: The High Priustess

Changing the subject, I heard on the radio that the stellar auto sales for 2014 may relate in part to the wind down in the war in Afghanistan, something also seen at the end of the Vietnam war. Basically service men and women getting back into normal life. They said the trend could last several years. Maybe we need to give those good folks some special green car incentives to encourage buying hybrids and so on.