Want A Prius? Take A Number
The Japanese auto industry might come back to much normal faster that thought. But then there is shippiing. It takes a while to float a few thousand cars across the Pacific. Now add high gas prices and a high demand for fuel efficient cars and you have the reason why Edmunds reports that the U.S. national inventory of the Toyota Prius is down to four-day supply. Ed Larocque, Toyota’s national marketing manager for advanced technology vehicles, told Edmunds that “production in Japan likely will return to full capacity by the end of June.” Which means that that wave of Prii won’t was ashore before end of July.
Matters wouldn’t be as tight if the Prius would be built stateside. According to Larocque, Toyota would “like to have a plant up and active” to assemble the Prius in the U.S. – at some point. originally, the Blue Springs, Mississippi, plant had been slated for Prius production. But then the recession intervened, and Blue Spring is building Corollas.
Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.
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People go out of their way to bash the Prius, but nobody seems to want to bash the Mazda 3, or Nissan Altima, or Ford Fusion, or.... The Prius is a car. It is exceptionally fuel efficient and has been shown to be extremely reliable. It is quiet and in many ways a very nice car. It has lots of backseat legroom and a convenient hatchback. It is a very reasonable car for someone to buy - reliable and efficient and priced competively given those attributes. Give it a rest, and since you hate them so much don't buy one.
I happened to be down on the harborfront in San Diego monday and within the span of an hour 2 car carriers were headed back out, one Honda-"badged". So something's coming into the ports already. I suspect the second one was Korean, but I'm too lazy to find the picture I took and look up the ship's registry info ;)
One thing is for certain, Prius actually had sizable rebates maybe four or five months ago. If you wanted a Prius that was the time to buy it.
Only thing I want a Prius for is so I could pilot an RAH-66 Comanche, perform a "snap turn" and sideways slip so I could shoot at it with Hydras until it bursts into flames. The only problem is finding someone to drive it at top speed. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a252qwNrSv0&feature=related