2009: Year of the hybrid sales boom bust?
Click above for high-res image gallery of the 2010 Honda Insight
Three things to note:
- The new Honda Insight went on sale in Japan earlier this year and has been selling well.
- Toyota has sold a million hybrids in the U.S.
- Ford has built 100,00 hybrid SUVs.
Sounds good, right? Not so fast. The truth is that, overall, hybrids are not selling well. We recently posted on how low gas prices and the poor economy have helped push used hybrid prices down 23.5 percent since last summer. The Chicago Tribune has a new story out on the growing disconnect between what buyers want (not hybrids) with what the automakers are releasing (more and more hybrids). Hybridcars.com found that hybrid sales fell "only" 29 percent compared to February 2008 and there is an 80-day supply of Priuses on dealer lots in the U.S. right now. Still, product pipelines are full of new hybrids (see the Insight, the new Prius, the new Milan, and many, many more) and, to mix metaphors a bit, that's a ship that is slow to change course.
Gallery: Review: 2010 Mercury Milan Hybrid
[Source: Chicago Tribune, Hybridcars.com]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
polo 2:40PM (3/16/2009)
Hybrids being down by only 20% when other vehicle lines are seeing 40% declines, isn't a bad thing. Context is everything.
It would also be stupid dumb for automakers to reduce plans for more efficient vehicles, as when the economy picks up, and gas prices go up with them, those same hybrids will once again be sales leaders.
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jm99 1:02PM (3/25/2009)
Sebastian, really, could you be any more mainstream-media-like in your alarmist spin on this? Yeah, hybrids were down a lot, but that same Hybridcars.com article you cite points out how they still greatly beat the sales rates of the market as a whole (which dropped something like 40%). While dropping less than the rest of the market is not an ideal scenario, in the current climate that counts as a bonafide butt-kicking.
Hybrids should still rightly be considered one of the few bright spots in the auto market right now, and I think that's a lot of the reason why the manufacturers are still chasing them. Yeah, the long lead times of their product planning cycles is part of it, but GM (and others) have recently shown how willing they are to put projects on indefinite hold in the current climate if they think it's not a sure thing or quick profit engine -- regardless of the maturity of the project (example: CTS coupe). So, since they are universally plowing forward with them, I think that effectively supports my position of hybrids being a market bright spot -- now, not just in the past.
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Max 2:44PM (3/16/2009)
And besides, energy prices will rise over the long term, by then we'll be happy to have affordable hybrid technology. If I had the money, I'd definitely consider a hybrid vehicle.
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Cellien 3:22PM (3/16/2009)
All I want is a Fiesta.. with all the bells and whistles the UK version has. 2 door. Sports package. Push button start. Paddle shifters. and... the good mpgs. :)
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Carney 4:00PM (3/16/2009)
This shows one of the many fatal flaws of the hybrid strategy.
The hybrid version of a vehicle costs THOUSANDS of extra dollars. In an economic slump, people will not spend that kind of money, especially when fuel prices are low. Even when they did, hybrids were basically irrelevant, amounting to a tiny fraction of cars sold. Overall, fuel efficiency has failed as a strategy - the MPG increase from 1976 to 1990 of 13 to 20 MPG was accompanies by a RISE in gasoline use from 89 to 103 billion barrels. The MOST the enormous sacrifice hybrids can do for us is keep us in a world with rapidly rising gasoline demand.
A MUCH smarter strategy is to mandate that all new cars sold be fully flex fueled. That costs only $100 per car for automakers and the cost is usually not even passed down to consumers. That way everyone will have gasoline slashing technology in their cars, whether they meant to get it or not, and can't be scared away from it when times are tougher and gas prices are lower.
If we couple that strategy with a willingness to tax or tariff oil to keep it more expensive than alcohol, then we easily, rolling downhill, switch from gasoline to alcohol over several years, as a country and a planet.
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PeterG 4:05PM (3/16/2009)
Yeah, this alarmist tripe gets old after a while.
We need context and how about some actual details. Hybrid sales fell less than the industry as whole so nothing to report there (nothing bad anyway). Until the numbers Industry falls 40% and hybrids fall 41%+ there is nothing negative going on. Hybrid sales are off what? Something like 20%? That is a win in this environment.
On the newest used sale price collapse. I want some actual numbers of prices so we can again compare to the industry as a whole. I strongly suspect this is compared to some nutso time when people were paying 99% of new prices for used Prius or similar. So this is probably just settling in to a more normal used car pricing, but again we get alarmist nonsense.
How about digging in and finding the price of used Prius compared to say a used Malibu with similar original pricing, instead of joining the Chicken Little brigade.
I am not a hybrid driver and doubt my next car will be hybrid either, but this Fox News style "Journalism" is pathetic.
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ziv 4:20PM (3/16/2009)
Carney, I would be down with the flex fuel mandate if there was the possibility of blending the gas with 10% Butanol and 10% Ethanol, then gradually increasing the percentage. But E85 is so energy poor, that even with the octane advantage, the lack of BTU's per gallon just kills you. There are so many sources of ethanol and butanol that are not dependent on corn that it seems like it is almost willful ignorance that we aren't harvesting btu's from sewage, garbage and even more from the agricultural byproducts.
On the hybrid front, dropping 29% when the market as a whole is dropping 40%, capped by the fact that gas prices are at a low point that is probably unsustainable, hybrids are doing pretty well. Production capacity is ramping up, more models are available, and when we pull out of this recession, hopefully soon, gas prices are going to skyrocket as will hybrid sales.
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Carney 4:49PM (3/16/2009)
Ethanol has two thirds the energy content of gasoline; methanol has one half. The "difficulty" having to stop for fuel more often with the same size of fuel tank poses, if any, is rather easily compensated for with the simple expedient of larger fuel tanks. Tanks for liquid fuels can fill the irregularly shaped space in between the exterior and interior of a car, much of which is currently empty.
Both are perfectly viable vehicle fuels, and are clean burning, can't be "cornered" like OPEC, and are thus price stable.
Force feeding ethanol into gasoline for gasoline-only cars to burn is a far worse strategy. In the first place, we've been doing that for decades and haven't weaned ourselves from oil yet.
In the second, since FULL flex fuel capability, the ability to run on 100% alcohol fuel, costs only $100 per car for automakers to add, why not just skip the intermediate steps in which we would continue to lavish OPEC with more of our money and foul the environment?
You're right that methanol derived from biomass like garbage and sewage will be a key part of any alcohol fueled future, and it's a shame that methanol has been pushed off the stage by the corn lobby. However, corn ethanol is and will remain a vital part of the alcohol economy too.
As for butanol, it will be so many years before mass production of it reaches viable levels that we can't afford to wait. I do support eventually substituting the 15% gasoline in E85 or M85 with butanol as much as possible, and making butanol the "premium" fuel in an alcohol lineup.
Bill 4:55PM (3/16/2009)
Well, we all better hope all new U.S. vehicles are flex-fuel capable, since it looks like the agribusiness lobby is going to be forcing E20 down our throats.
Starting on a state level (those of you in the midwest), but I'm sure being mandated by the feds in the next few years.
I'm sure we'll all enjoy paying more for lower quality fuel.
Snowdog 7:07AM (3/17/2009)
Carney:
Your blatant Ethanol lobbying is getting ridiculous.
What not enough Ethanol stories to lobby in lately to make your quota so you have to start invading unrelated threads to lobby?
Carney 1:09PM (3/17/2009)
Snowdog, I note that my last response to you was substantive, addressing many of your stated concerns directly. Not only did you ignore my response, but you have also failed to directly respond to any of my points here, preferring instead to take things to a personal level.
In any event, obviously I'm a strong supporter of alcohol fuels, including not just ethanol but also methanol. And I'm also a critic of other strategies, and from time to time I'll point out why.
Carney 2:03PM (3/17/2009)
Bill, see my reply to the identical comment you made here:
http://tinyurl.com/cq269j
Lad 4:54PM (3/16/2009)
It will be interesting to see if PHEVs and true BEVs will stimulate the market; the current crop of mild HEVs fall short of what the future promises; perhaps, that promise of better hybrids and battery only cars is a factor holding back sales.
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Dave 6:21PM (3/16/2009)
Nice trolling, Sebastian.
Looks like your plot to drum up posts has worked.
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PeekOyle 8:50AM (3/17/2009)
The thing is, that up until now with the Honda Insight, we havent really had a mid-sized hybrid that competes price-wise. Here in Australia a Prius costs nearly double the retail price of a base model Corolla and a Civic Hybrid costs 30% more than the standard Civic. They really arent even close enough to that magic high volume price point that the average joe would even 'consider one'.
Anyone know what the retail cost of the new Insight will be down here in AUD?
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majortom1981 11:24PM (3/16/2009)
Actually we should mandate multi fuel vehicles. .I think its brazil that has cars that operate on 4 different fuels.
Also how much of these declines are due to people holding out due to say the 2010 prius and the honda inisght?
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jim 9:48AM (3/17/2009)
The difficulty that high mileage cars face whether hybrid, EV, or just plain small, is that the consumer will not pay more for better mileage unless the payback is reasonable and they want to have a minimum size vehicle for comfort. The current approach of forcing the manufacturers to reach a mileage standard, and then not providing an incentive to the consumer to buy the efficient vehicles is asinine.
If gas taxes won't be raised, then a poor mileage tax needs to be added to the price of the vehicle and become a surcharge on the annual registration. That revenue could fund tax rebates for the purchase of emerging vehicles that are deploying high mileage technologies.
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