Chevy stops Volt production (temporarily ...)

amusing

 

IMHO he may simply be delusional. I hope that using the socratic method either he will relize he is wrong, or at least get people that follow him, to relize he is wrong.

Year to Date
#1 F-series - 409,656
#20 Rav 4 - 120,371

#133 volt - 13,497
#224 Toyota Land Cruiser with - 1767, and it is doing much better than last year
#232 Mitsubishi Eclipse - 1047

Prius phv would be if broken out separately
#178 prius phv 6068

No one would confuse the plug-ins with mid market cars, nor are they selling badly for their place on the rung of innovation. Killing the HOV stickers and $4000 incentives in california for the prius phv, would likely drop its sales by a sizable margin. John's idea that the prius phv is mid market and can do well without incentives is contrary to the data. Hi definition of mid-market appeared to be the top 16 selling vehicles in volume that were compact to midsize cars. I expanded it down to #20, thinking he might not have even bothered to know the list.

I think he was giving his definition to mid market. I think it is a poor definition, but we can judge his points by his definiton, and conclude neither the gen I prius, nor the prius phv are mid market. He has also said "targeted to mid market", which would mean toyota has done a very bad job at targetting. IMHO john just lacks any understanding of the market toyota is chasing with the phv, and has read fragments of his own to determine toyota's goals.

He put out a definition that shows his points are incorrect. If I have judged it incorrectly I leave it to john to clarify.

 

So by your definition, nothing you have presented since I joined PC has been a fact. Interesting way you look at and interact with the world.

Was the list of cars your attempt at a definition? Or was it just a fragment of sequence of a list of cars presented out of context?

 

very limited number of people are thinking that Volt is innovative car, as evidenced by low sales, and current state of production (factory idled).

this idea that Prius started slow so Volt is doing great by starting slow is really laughable. It is not 1998 anymore.

Toyota is going to sell 1,200,000 hybrids this year. Investing billions into Volt and selling 30k worldwide (at best), is horrible business decision by GM.

This is why their stock is down the crapper and why Forbes run article yesterday on why GM is going to go out of business again.

 

Hmm think you forgot that innovation is not measured by short term sales. What about all those awards for the Volt.. Oh and the factory retooling for another car is not really relevant to "innovation".

Nope, its not 1998 anymore. Its 2012 and just doing a hybrid is no longer innovation. That is why the volt has to over more of a average jump in MPG (median on voltstats.net is 175) over tradational vehichles. But the bias and stupidity of many people is equally as bad as it was in 1998. Its sad to see people that are at in tune enough to drive a prius, have such a bias.

 

You mean the record sales in August? Don't you remember we debunked your false point. Innovation is not directly related to sales. innovative products don't sell as well as cheap crap. How may fast food hamburgers and toyota corollas do they sell.

The prius phv is also starting slow. It is how the pyrimid of innovation. Just because you are ignorant doesn't mean you get to repeat things that are wrong.

I read that toyota is now losing money on every prius shipped to america. Can you point me to world wide toyota hybrid sales? I thought that they were supposed to drop when the japanese subsidies stopped.

The stock is doing badly because of European losses. If you read the business section of a newspaper or the financial reports, or my past posts to you, you might realize that. GM has lost over $1B in europe on each of the last 2 years, and has not been profitable there for 14 years. If you can't understand the news,you should not just make up some of your own.

 

Camry, Malibu, Fusion, Corolla, Cruze, Focus, etc... Those buyers are the consumers being targeted by the Prius family.

Who is the market for Volt?

 

And yet they won't put an automatic 5, or greater, speed into the Corolla or Scion. As innovators of technology, why is Toyota using such old tech 4 speeds when nearly everyone else as moved on?

 

Do you really imagine that the prius phv targets the corolla and malibu driver. If so its an absolute failure.

As many of us have said before the volt, leaf, prius phv, and other plug-ins target initial adopters. By your definition the phv is a failure. Did you consider buying a malibu before choosing the phv?

 

I guess me, for one, since I traded in an 08 TCH. <shruggs>

 

Are those what it was aimed at when it launched? or now?
Which member of the family? PHV?
What is the basis for that statement, or just your personal point of view?


I don't agree with austing.. If people buying those cars are is the prius target market then it its slowly making progress. But people in that market tend to keep cars for a while, so the fill in is alway slow. If that is the market for the PHV, its probably failing. I would expect the people buying the PHV are already toyota loyalists.


If you want to know what GM's target is y you should ssk GM, not us.

But my gustimate would be the intended market for the Volt was (and will be for 1-2 more years) people that buy Priuses, lexus or other hybrids, and people that buy near-luxury high-tech cars (BMW, Caddy, Audi, etc). The former submarket car about efficency, the latter about quality and technology. The volt provides both.

I'd say the goal was 40% hybrid buyers and 60% near luxury buyers.
I say that is the targe because those markets will pay a premium over a regular ICE to get what they want, and because the car's quality and ride definately goes after the latter group. If they just wanted hyrid owners, lower cost with cheaper interiors would have done fine. The near luxury buyers are willing to pay a higher premium than the hybrid owners. And as a Halo car (clearly one of its goals) people tend to yearn for higher-cost near-luxury cars more than hybrids, so the cruze buyer would be more drawn to see a high-quality high-tech Volt than something that comes accorss a aimed at the hybrid market. Generally better to be preceived as slightly "above" the market than off on the side.

Oh by they way.. is that your formal definition of "middle market".. cars that target buyers of those 6 models? (By the way, I would think of those as mass-market not middle market).

But also which of those models exexted in 2000 when you said the prius was targeting middle market.?

 

I thought I was pretty clear, this was not the target for the phv. Toyota said there goal for the phv was 50K/year mainly in Japan. The corola and malibu are low priced low tech cars meant not to offend, but sell in high volumes. I can not imagine a customer going into a toyota dealership for a corola and coming out with a prius phv. The dealers don't know how to sell them, and toyota isn't even making them available in most of the country. We can listen to toyota on the prius family though -
http://www.toyota-global.com/sustainability/report/er/pdf/er11_p04_p09.pdf
The gen I was not reaching for mid market. Clearly toyota was saying the introductions of the gen III and prius v/alpha are going main stream. This is not the prius phv. If the phv was targeting corolla and malibu buyers whatever that means they totally missed the market. There is no indication from toyota that is what they were doing. They may want to up sell a malibu buyer into a camry hybrid, but that is an entirely different animal, with a higher profit margin than a phv.

This is what gm was saying -
Volt's Target Buyers Are Techies, Not Greenies | Special: Chevy 100 - Advertising Age
Initial adopters of technology, not environmental buyers nor those looking to get a low tech inexpensive car like a corrola.

Nissan LEAF and Chevy Volt Target Different Drivers
It is trying to say it can appeal to mainstream drivers, but clearly it is charging more for the technology. I disagree with this author about mainstream and you can see the advertising age information in the previous link.

 

Since I have already provided the Camry/Malibu & Corolla/Cruze reference literally dozens of times...

 

Do you agree that the phv does not sell well to these customers, or do you think its a marketing failure on toyota's part?

Which prius model do you think Toyota is targeting more to the camry buyer than the camry hybrid?

I'm fascinated by your marketing insight.

 

Sorry but using a car as an example does not, to me, make it a definition. Lots of people compare cars across segments, and that does not make it a definition. Just examples can be confusing. Especially given that camery is the top selling car (hence not in the "middle" of anything), I would never have guess that was your definition. I cannot read your mind for what non-standard definition you want to apply to a phrase (heck I can hardly follow the logic when you do say something that is closer to complete thoughts). Its even more confusing since some cars such as the accord, civic and altima are missing, so I don't know how to generalize the pattern to include the cars on the list but exclude the accord, civic and altima.

In fact its still not a definition that is consistent with your statements that the Prius was targeted to middle market but the volt was not. I can assure you those are examples of cars, not people. So company is targeting selling their cars to the examples on that list. Do you mean to type of peope that buy those cars, or do you mean middle market is matching the the volume of sales of those cars, or do you mean something else.

If you had been clear it the sales volume of those cars would be easy to say, neither the gen-1 volt, and the gen-1 prius, had any intention of becoming a top-selling car in their first generation in the US. Nothing I've ever seen from either company suggested it would be a top-selling car in gen 1. They are looking to the further, not the short term.

If you mean the same buyers, then no the volt is not aiming at people that want a 19-23K car. They might wish they could buy a volt, and it might be a halo for the cruze, but if they can only affort a 20K car, they won't be buying a volt. GM knew that upfront. And I'll bet toyota was not looking to cannibalize their camey/corolla sales any more than GM wanted to cannibalize Malibu/cruze -- they wanted to attract buyers from other manufacturers.

 

As an interested party, one who has owned both the Gen II and Gen III and has hoped to find other manufacturers not simply pick up some hybrid technology but truly migrate away from gas guzzling machines to automobiles and trucks sized and fitted to real size uses, I have followed the Honda, Toyota, Ford, Nissan & Chevy/GM activities with great interest across the years. I've hoped for success, though I haven't always thought each company has taken the best approach.

I have chosen the Prius. It is not simply an innovative design, but it is well engineered and produced. The car has sold well because it has performed well, it has proven itself out over time, and it is at a price point affordable for a certain segment of the population.

I used to think the hybrid was simply a bridge to the EV. I don't think that is the case in the foreseeable future, because battery size, capacity, cost and performance haven't yet arrived at the point where the ICE becomes expendable. Even so, the Prius, as we know it, is not the be all and end all.

Is the Volt going to be the car or the type of car which replaces the Prius? I doubt it, but I really don't know. To me, the serial hybrid was the sensible approach, but I don't see that the size, design, cost, etc. have lined up yet to make it all work.

I'm hoping the one great thing coming out of the success of the Prius is the openness of the American car buyer (AND reviewer) to innovative changes and advances.

On a different, but unfortunately related note: If I am going to put my two cents in to a discussion on these matters, I'd like to be able to do it on PriusChat. I am wondering know how possible is such a wish, given the tenor of this thread (and others on similar topics).

Having read (and contributed at times) to this thread from its first posting, I was enjoying the discussion and lively banter for the first 300-350 posts. After than it has dropped down to a morass of name-calling, chest-beating diatribe. I don't want to point fingers at fellow PC members, so please take a moment to consider whether you are helping things along. Perhaps all it will take is another 15-20 seconds in order to review what you've written before posting it. Most of my regrets from sending offensive posts could have been avoided by editing my own words before posting them.

It is one thing to amuse yourself with fun quips and sharp remarks. It is quite another to disparage someone's person and reputation.

If you think my argument does not make sense, then please ask me to explain it. If you think I've misquoted something, point me to the correct language. If you think I'm simply wrong, then tell me you understand but disagree. But, do not tell me "IMHO you're an idiot." I'll spare everyone the "Can't we all just get along" rhetoric, but I will ask for a more civil tone on PriusChat, generally, and on this thread, in particular.

 

I am using what EPA uses. If you have the recent data that shows Volt emit lower emission out of the box, do show us! From what I have seen of eGRID 2012 data, 5% improvements were made. That not enough to even close the gap.

It won't be out of the box experience then. If we want to go there, Prius owner can buy renewable electricity to nullify the petroleum consumption as well.

Early adoption rate for Prius PHV is about the same as Volt and Leaf combined.

Expanding the green market will be good. Except, Volt is not green. If it's tailpipe and beyond emissions were the same as Prius, provide mid-size interior and costs $30k, I will be praising it like C-MAX Energi. Volt is a step backward out of the box, period.

Sure, there are some exception where some individuals that feel is right to use renewable electricity inefficiently. In that case, the carbon footprint would be lower but you are still wasting a lot of renewable electricity carrying the entire gasoline powertrain.

Cherry pick whatever mode you want. Overall, Volt emits more greenhouse gas than a regular Prius. That's a choice to move backward and I am not supporting it.

 

It is an acknowledgement that Volt is getting more attention than it deserves. I am confident that a good engineered car would prevail over a moonshot rush.

That's a wild claim that I have never heard before. Care to share the source? A choice is good. A bad choice is not good.

 

Two third of last month Volt sales were leases. I don't know the industry average for the lease vs. purchase but that seems high.

 

I'm not sure what box you are living in, but most of us live in places in the world, and do not use the average 2007 electricity. This has been pointed out to you numerous times. Originally some pointed out that the grid was going to get more coal intense. Data is quite to the contrary, and it is getting cleaner. This plug-ins will run for many years. If you are conserned about ghg then obviously you would switch to less intense electricity for your home. That is whether you buy an ev or not. Please pick a city, and I can tell you what the ghg/kwh is in 2011 or 2010. No one plugs into the nation, and plug-ins are not evenly distriuted.

You must have some new fangled definition. What is the early adoption rate?

Sales rate for the volt appears to be higher, at least if you consider 2831 higher than 1047. The volt and prius phv both had good and similar growth from July.

Your definition of green is majorly warped. In california the biggest market for the prius phv, the volt produces less total pollutants including ghg. I have never heard that 5 seats are environmental but 4 are not. And again you are stuck in some box, because you need that box to make your point. I can understand if you say the phv is a better car for you, but you seem to be making arbitrarily bad choices when it comes to defining environmental.

And here I was thinking 98 mpge was about the same as 95 mpge in charge depletion mode. Its nice to hear that 95 is greener than 98. Is there a special code book. I don't think the wind has much of a carbon foot print, it does have a small one as it requires some other resources to be used less efficiently, but hardly as big as burning extra gasoline.

But it is you that is chery picking. do you really think drinnovations volt emits more greenhouse gas, or gwmorts. You are saying if you buy a plug-in you can't live on the west coast and you can't buy renewables. That is quite an ugly box you've built for yourself. Infact isn't the volt lower in ghg in new york where you live?