American buyers find the Toyota Prius more difficult and expensive to buy

13 May 2008

Toyota Motor's Prius hybrid, the most fuel-efficient car sold in the US, is getting harder to find on dealer lots and commanding higher prices when customers do manage to get one.

It is no surprise that with galloping fuel costs, automakers are continually reporting declining sales. Nowhere is this effect more profound than in the US, the biggest car market in the world, whose privileged inhabitants had enjoyed the benefits of cheap fuel for decades to become extravagant energy consumers.

However, with changing times a larger number of Americans are turning in their fuel-guzzling SUVs for more efficient alternatives. And it's this change in perspective that has catapulted a Japanese car company to the top position in the country in terms of sales.

Yes, we are talking of Toyota, a company that has enjoyed enormous success over the last decade and rewrote the rules of fuel efficiency with its groundbreaking Prius. However, even Toyota hasn't been able to shake off the debilitating effects of the ongoing financial crisis.

Its US sales, down 3.3 per cent this year through April, are heading for the first annual decrease since 1995. This has resulted in a 28 per cent drop in profit last week for the quarter ended 31st March. Moreover, things don't look too rosy on the near future either, with Toyota president Katsuaki Watanabe predicting a 6.4 per cent decline in North American sales for the year ending next March.

Amongst all this gloom, there is one bright spot – the Toyota Prius. Overall vehicle sales may have declined, but Prius deliveries are up 23 per cent in 2008, to 64,664 vehicles. Already the world's best-selling hybrid, the Prius was No. 8 in US passenger-car sales through April, it's highest ranking.