Toyota May Scale Back Its Prius Lineup Due To Slow Sales

of course.

 

Read 'em, and weep...Correction on my retraction:
The 2012 and 2013 numbers appear exactly CORRECT.
However, the numbers represent sales of all Prius Models (Liftback + c + v + Plug In):

(Sales are Liftback + c + v + Plug-in)


For 2016 were are heading towards 140,000 unit sales of LB + c + v ....dare I say down 90,000 to 100,000 units from the 2012 peak.

Obviously the big "bump" in 2012 was the start of c + v + Plug-in sales.

So getting back to the original question, if we compare Gen4 LB first year to Gen3 LB first year, we are talking about maybe 100k year end sales (2016) vs. 141k (2010).

It's not quite as bad as all that:
we now have popular new model RAV4 Hybrid may get 45,000 sales in 2016, so that's part of where the Prius/hybrid sales went.

 

so what fuel prices are down, that means it is even cheaper to drive the Prius, I am spending about $15 a month on gas.

all it will take is a major hurricane to hit Houston to disrupt refining, an earthquake to hit Cushing, Oklahoma where the worlds largest oil storage facility sits or terrorist attack on oil fields/ports in Saudi Arabia to cause a sudden spike in fuel prices.

 

Put it this way, I am still not going back to 2 minivans. One minivan and one Prius gives excellent protection against fuel price increases. OK maybe one Prius v and one minivan.

By the way, slow sales?? Japan looks on target for 450,000 Gen4 + Prius c sales in 2016!!
Slow sales is not the problem. Fast sales of Gen4 and c is the problem for Toyota.

 

Yes, sales are slow. That's why cash is piled on the hood and manufacturers offer 0% interest rates. If the demand were there the cars would be selling for MSRP. Try only paying MSRP to a Dodge dealer for a Hellcat. I suspect at best you'll be laughed out of the showroom.

 

yep, we're victims of our own desires. who will bail us out when gas goes up?

 

I believe that the price of gasoline is a factor in declining sales ..... but not the major reason. Almost everyone knows gas prices will go up .... priustexasbob pointed out the obvious.
While overall, fuel efficient automobile sales are down, Tesla, Volt, Rav4 sales are doing fairly well. Tesla, Volt, Ford, Leaf and BWM all sold more that 1000 vehicles in August, and Tesla and Volt were considerably more. I suspect that many people, including myself, were turned off by some design decisions made by Toyota. The Prime could have brought me back, until I read articles about the anticipated cost, and very limited EV miles.

 

Those people, including yourself, were not the intended audience. So, it doesn't make any difference.

Remember, Toyota is targeting ordinary consumers. These are the people who will bring about the high-volume profitable sales without dependency on tax-credit subsidies. That's a really big deal not being taken into account.

 

I do not know. I consider myself a function-driven buyer - I buy based on utility, not on style. But the styling of the current crop of Toyotas really turns me off. It may not have made a difference a few years ago when Toyota was the only name in hybrids - but there are a lot of choices out there now and Toyota can't afford to put too many obstacles, extreme styling included, in the path of potential customers.

 

What actual style trait? We're seeing every automaker embrace LED lighting. Toyota is simply a little ahead of the game I that regard.

Is looking the same really a good thing anyway? Notice how GM's upcoming Bolt looks similar to Honda Fit and Nissan Versa? It may help initially, but then it becomes nothing special.

Both RAV4 traditional & hybrid stand out of the crowd. Both are selling well...

 

it's the fish mouth and gills that has upended my teacart. and why would you design a front end that reduced aerodynamics?

 

In styling there's a strong herd mentality afoot these days, or maybe I'm just more cognizant of it, do not know.

I can picture a Pied Piper behind the scenes, dropping hints: "everybody's doing faux air scoops on the front bumpers, "angry" headlights, steeply raked beltlines, cartoonishly large wheel wells, flat-black "skirts" on the rear bumpers, rear bumper faux air exhausts. C'mon, you don't want to miss out."

 

That's the way it has been for decades. Certain styles dominate for awhile, then something quite different ends taking over.

Knowing what actually catches on is anyone's guess. There's no rhyme or reason either.

 

style is always in style, but you can't buy good taste.

 

john1701a - I'd need to check, but I think you have thrown out this "you are not the intended target" before.

Just who do you think IS .... the intended target?
I drive a Toyota hybrid now; I traded a 2010 Prius that I bought new; I have owned more new Toyota vehicles than any other brand (cars and trucks); I have been responsible for at least three direct sales of Toyota products to friends; I am in the market; I have the money; my wife is "on-board" for buying a new hybrid .... I have been a faithful "brand-loyal" advocate. If I am not a viable target for Toyota ..... maybe they should re-evaluate auto sales and sell some other product.

 

I honestly wouldn't be surprised if the Prius + gets replaced in Europe by a hypothetical Verso Hybrid - they're somewhat similarly-sized vehicles with similar roles, after all, and in the next generation, the Verso could always be embiggened to overlap the former Prius +. As far as the US, in this crossover-crazy country, I can't see anything other than the RAV4 Hybrid replacing the Prius v, especially given that the v didn't get the third row of the + and α.

And, the Prius c... it's popular in Japan, so it may actually survive into a second generation as the Aqua, for all I know. However, I wouldn't be surprised to see things rolled into the Yaris Hybrid (as it already is in Europe).

As far as the intended market of the Gen 4 Prius... some of PriusChat seems to dislike it for styling reasons, normal people seem to dislike it because it's not a crossover, a huge portion of automotive enthusiasts seem to despise it for styling reasons based on what I see on such websites (I've been trying to convince them to see it as an old Citroën without the unreliability, and with more methamphetamines involved in the styling department, but...) So, what is the market?

 

not gen 4, prime. and the target is conquest sales, i.e. the other 97%. toyota is willing to give up you, me and the 3% whatever it's taken 20 years too garner. can't say i blame them, it has to be disappointing.

 

To be fair, I am the conquest sale market (with Gen 4 in general, not just the Prime, which I count as part of the Gen 4 family), and it worked on me. The thing is, how much of the existing base is buying Gen 4s, how many normals are buying Gen 4s, and how many enthusiasts are buying Gen 4s?

 

we were all conquest sales at one time. many have moved on to bev's or back to gassers. the % of alt fuel vehicles hasn't changed in years, but hybrids have dropped, and bev's have increased. for every gasser conquest, some one leaves and buys an suv.

look around, what are your friends, relatives and neighbors driving. that's the target.

 

So, most of my friends drive TDIs - some plan on hanging onto the TDI no matter what, some plan on replacing it with a BEV, not much in between.

My relatives... many actually do drive Toyota products, and there's some interest in the hybrid products there. My dad in particular... he's got a Matrix and a Silverado 2500, and he'd consider replacing the Matrix... with a RAV4 Hybrid or a Prius v. (The Liftback won't do what he needs it to do.)

My neighbors... most of them aren't buying a Prius, because... well, looking out there, the only Priuses in their price range aren't in good shape, and actually need a battery. Better off buying a Corolla or a Vibetrix, in that case, they have less to go wrong (because, let's face it, these are the kind of people who wouldn't buy a new battery from the Toyota dealer, they'd buy whatever the cheapest battery is, and it'd fail quickly).

My coworkers... one could actually really use a PHEV (she drives an Outback IIRC... and lives half a mile from work), one enjoys his Pontiac G8 GT, and the other... the only way you'd get him into a hybrid is if Ford made an F-150 Hybrid.