Toyota Prius Surpasses One Million U.S. Sales

~edmunds AutoObserver   By Bill Visnic April 7, 2011

When Toyota Motor Corp. announced yesterday the millionth version of its Prius hybrid-electric car had been sold in the U.S., the number placed in perspective the impact of the seminal nameplate not just in the U.S., but for the entire auto industry. Few remember, however, that the vehicle now-synonymous with environmentally friendly personal transportation wasn’t the first modern-day mass-market hybrid.

That was rival Honda Motor Co. Ltd.s’ original Insight, a car that went on sale in the U.S. in late 1999, beating the Prius by several months. The Insight was as shockingly odd-looking as the first-generation Prius, but was hampered mostly by its 2-seat configuration.

But the distinction between the first-generation Insight and the Prius that emerged as the real difference in making the Prius an industry icon and the Insight a footnote: Toyota had gambled on “strong” hybrid technology – now dubbed “Hybrid Synergy Drive” – that made the electric motor and the batteries to power it more prevalent in the propulsion equation. Honda settled on a “mild” hybrid strategy centered on its “Integrated Motor Assist,” a less-powerful (and in fairness, less costly) design that used a smaller electric machine mainly as an occasional booster for the gasoline engine.

Toyota’s full-hybrid approach – and the decidedly more significant gains in fuel economy it delivered compared with Honda’s IMA strategy – proved to be the one that best delivered on the promise of hybridization. It clicked with customers, who also recognized the benefits and now have rewarded Toyota will 1 million U.S. sales in the nearly 11 years since the first Prius was launched.

Symbol Of A New Direction
In dominating the market with the Prius, Toyota also established it as a household name with a new generation of environmentally concerned consumers. But along the way, Toyota also prevailed over rivals not as convinced that hybridization, the Toyota way, was the best path to increased efficiency and consumers’ wallets. General Motors Co. grudgingly played, at first with its own mild-hybrid arrangement and later with the “2-mode” system designed to elevate the economy of the rear- and 4-wheel-drive pickups and SUVs GM preferred as the focus for its hybridization. Jointly developed with BMW AG and the then- DaimlerChrysler AG, the 2-mode technology was expensive and failed to convert consumers in any fashion similar to the Prius.

After GM subsequently announced a directional shift towards the plug-in hybrid technology of the Volt, there were public and some behind-the-scenes jousts with Toyota about each system’s merits. In the end, Toyota may in a small fashion have lost this argument; the company had resisted plug-in development, saying the advantages of carrying larger battery packs or, as in the case of the Volt, a battery-charging engine, were nominal. But Toyota effectively gave in on this next-generation development of the hybridization it made famous: there will be a plug-in Prius next year.

For now, though, when customers and the industry speak “hybrid,” they think Prius. And the enormous footing the nameplate established has carried Toyota to sales of 3 million hybrids globally, a number exponentially exceeding what any rival can claim. Moreover, the Prius has emerged as the unquestioned “go to” model when gasoline prices rise, a cycle that’s been repeated numerous times in the decade-plus after the Prius was launched. The current third-generation Prius is rated by the Environmental Protection Agency at 51 miles per gallon in the city and 48 mpg on the highway. And this gas-saving apparently has a lasting effect: Toyota says 97 percent of the 1 million Priuses sold are on the road.

“Since the Prius went on sale eleven years ago not a year has gone by when it hasn’t been the number one selling hybrid vehicle in the U.S,” said Bob Carter, Toyota Division group vice president and general manager, in a statement. “Prius paved the way for hybrids and while it is still the hybrid leader in sales and fuel economy, I’m proud to say that since its introduction, 13 other auto brands have seen the benefits of hybrid technology and joined the hybrid market.”

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