Prius Sales Up 20.7% in November

This is yr to yr increase. Actual 10 Prius sale is down from October.

when did C4C end?? cause if it covered any of October, a decline from that month to this one would mean nothing

C4C ended late Aug, as I recall.

looks like it ended in Aug?? ...

http://www.cars.gov/

says program was extended to end Nov 1 or "when money runs out"

but also says program ran fewer than 30 days. so ended last aug sometimes

Considering gas is cheaper and its been stable, Prius sales are amazing. It is becoming a true family car alternative. I threw the Prius in my sales list below and it does quite well. Mind you while its small in size, the price is more expensive than most of these vehicles.


Mainstream Family
Camry- 27,385
Accord-17,239
Altima-15,490
Fusion-13,774
Malibu-11,113
Sonata-8,178
Jetta-7,957
G6-5,852
Avenger-3,571
Sebring- 3,044
Mazda6-2,297
Optima-1,644

Small Family
Corolla-21,899
Civic-13,652
Focus- 10,196
Prius-9,607
Elantra-6,127
Mazda3-5,923
Sentra-5,210
Cobalt-5,112
Forte-4,044
Impreza- 2,555

Subcompacts
Versa-5,554
Accent-3,831
Fit-3,570
Yaris- 3,557
Rio-3,496
Soul-2,505
Aveo-2,212
Cube-1,565
xB-1,392
SX4-1087
xD-822

Amazingly the Lexus HS outsold the much cheaper Insight.

Prius-9,607
HS 250h-1,407
Insight-1,403
450h-1,210
Civic hybrid-243
Ford hybrid models include the Ford Fusion, Ford Escape, Mercury Milan and Mercury Mariner. Sales of Ford hybrid vehicles totaled 2,361

Year to year changes are the industry standard for tracking auto sales changes. Month to month IMHO is meaningless as there's a lot of variation month to month for the industry as a whole and I believe it always follows a specific pattern.

What happened to Civic hybrid? Are they going to kill it?

I received my verification on August 19 and remember that the government ran out of money and announced the end of the program the next week.

Probably - Insight sales have completely cannibalized HCH sales.

Honda needs to either make it cheaper, or ditch it. They also should produce a real Accord Hybrid to complete with the Camry/Fusion Hybrids - but I wouldn't be surprised to see another lightweight hybrid (like the rumored CRZ) first since the IMA is better suited to lighter vehicles given it's electrical torque/hp limits.

This is actually huge news, because Nov.2008 was right after the fuel crisis.

The Insight outsold the Civic hybrid? Wow. Here in Southern California, we see significantly more Civic hybrids than Insights. I guess the rest of the world likes the Insight better. Interesting. I would have never guess, but hey statistics is statistics.

I sure hope Honda doesn't kill the Civic hybrid. They need it. Half of all hybrids I see on the road are dedicated hybrid models and half are models shared with traditional engines. It is obvious that half of society wants a hybrid but doesn't want "a spaceship looking thing."

That didn't go as planned. Honda now has to make a hard decision. They can't drop the price of the Insight because that will make the Civic hybrid even less attractive.

They need to drop the price of both....

You are comparing 6 years of HCH sales to about 9 months of Insight sales.

There's going to be a LOT more Civics on the road than Insights.

The Insight has been outselling the HCH by a large margin ever since it was introduced.

I think the 9,609 Prius number is too small than their target.

Toyota's initial target was 20k/month in NA, 10k in EU and 10k in JP.
However, there is a huge demand in Japan, still 6 months wait, then they increased the production to 50k/month and are delivering more than 25k/month for JP.

The 1,403 Insight number is also too small.

Honda's initial target was 8k+/month in NA, 2k+ in EU and 5k in JP.
Only in JP, they exceeds the target delivering 8k/month.

The best Prius selling was 24k in May 2007 when gasoline price was $4/gallon.
Is the gasoline price is still cheap in the US?

Ken@Japan

~US$2.49 for 87 octane gasoline (regular grade) in southern Arizona.

Went to one of the local Toyota dealers in Tucson (Precision Toyota) today to buy a 12V battery for my HiHy. I saw around a dozen 2010 Prius on the lot and their website says they have 21 in inventory.

I agree even though being up 20.7% sounds better than October 2009 up by 14.3%. I had considered year ago, late 2008 sales to be 'inventory clearance' combined with the first hits of the economic slow-down that started in September 2008. It fully hit home in October and November 2008 (where did that year go?)

The outstanding question is how much inventory is on the lot. In one respect, the sample could be "delivery" and it may be that tracking ship arrivals, we could come up with a 'days since ship came in.' But it might be easier to sample 10-15 online Toyota dealerships and sample their 'inventory'.

My take is:

• Congratulations Japan - your growing population of Prius and other fuel efficient vehicles will serve well when fuel prices go up again.
• Uh Oh, USA - part of sales is available inventory but it doesn't make sense to park inventory, unsold, in dealer lots.
• 15k EU and Pacific (?) - these other non-Japanese markets should start looking a lot like markets of equal size to the USA.

Traditionally, fuel costs start back up in December in the USA. Starting from $2.50/gal does not bode well for prices in the Spring.

Bob Wilson

Automaker|Nov. 2009|Nov. 2008|Pct. chng.|11 month 2009|11 month 2008|Pct. Chng|YTD status|Nov trend
TOTAL|747,086|747,051|0%|9,401,432|12,350,612|-24%|avg|avg
General Motors****|150,676|153,404|-2%|1,864,211|2,734,789|-32%|bad|bad
Toyota‡‡|133,700|130,307|3%|1,582,287|2,075,711|-24%|avg|GOOD
Ford Motor Co.***|122,846|122,723|0%|1,493,533|1,863,954|-20%|GOOD|avg
Chrysler Group LLC|63,560|85,260|-25%|844,879|1,363,309|-38%|bad|bad
Honda (American)†|74,003|76,233|-3%|1,043,641|1,342,680|-22%|GOOD|bad
Nissan‡|56,288|46,605|21%|696,699|889,249|-22%|GOOD|GOOD
Hyundai Group††|46,002|34,403|34%|680,282|636,458|7%|GOOD|GOOD
VW‡‡‡|23,191|21,290|9%|267,955|288,139|-7%|GOOD|GOOD
BMW Group*|18,302|19,799|-8%|218,440|281,971|-23%|avg|bad
Mazda|14,255|14,134|1%|189,512|245,984|-23%|avg|GOOD
Daimler AG**|17,461|16,009|9%|184,299|228,885|-19%|GOOD|GOOD
Subaru|16,988|13,706|24%|193,578|170,412|14%|GOOD|GOOD
Mitsubishi|2,925|5,096|-43%|49,631|92,687|-46%|bad|bad
Suzuki|1,540|3,216|-52%|36,810|81,215|-55%|bad|bad
Porsche|1,626|1,378|18%|17,585|23,881|-26%|bad|GOOD
Jaguar Land Rover†††|3,319|2,755|20%|33,420|19,597|71%|GOOD|GOOD
Other (estimate)|304|444|-32%|3,347|4,877|-31%|bad|bad
Isuzu|–|130|-100%|165|4,570|-96%|bad|bad
Maserati|100|159|-37%|1,158|2,244|-48%|bad|badSource: http://www.autonews.com/article/20091201/RETAIL/311309908/1078/FRONTPAGE

I'd made a mistake in the first table but it looks OK now. Notables:

• Chrysler - what a fall, Honda has overtaken them
• Hyundai - exceptional performance, worth watching

Just looking at the businesses including those making hybrids. I was hoping hybrids would be Toyota's growth generator but it looks like is has been a shield to help bring along others.

Bob Wilson

Thank you!

FYI, following is the stat of sales ranking, sale number and Y2Y ratio in Japan.
(no Y2Y ratio for Insight-II because of new)

Insight-II went on sale in Feb. and 2010 Prius in May.
(Nov stat will be announced on Dec 4th)
(edit: Nov stat added on Dec 4th)
[table="head"]month|Prius rank|Prius number|Y2Y ratio|Insight rank|Insight number
Feb|12th|4,524|77.8%|10th|4,906
Mar|13th|5,997|78.1%|21st|4,088
Apr|21st|1,952|35.8%|1st|10,481
May|1st|10,915|214.9%|3rd|8,859
Jun|1st|22,292|357.8%|4th|8,782
Jul|1st|27,712|392.6%|4th|10,210
Aug|1st|21,669|460.3%|4th|7,900
Sep|1st|31,758|441.5%|5th|10,289
Oct|1st|26,918|424.5%|9th|7,047
Nov|1st|26,815|428.7%|5th|9,413
[/table]

Source: Japanese passenger vehicle sales ranking

Ken@Japan

Minor note , Under Mazda year change you have it at 14% instead of -14%