This Just In: People Buy Hybrids to Save Gas!

We've been very interested to note suggestions that folks buy cars like the Prius, and the Camry and Highlander hybrids, so that they can be, well, cool. So that they can demonstrate their concern for the environment, so that they can be part of "the green movement."

We recognize that often, there are elements of environmental concern tied to each hybrid purchase. We hope there are, in fact. More and more, though, as gasoline prices continue to spiral upward, it seems that buyers are focused on the fuel savings these vehicles offer.

According to the folks at Edmunds.com, who analyzed visits to the various vehicle pages on the elaborate and popular Edmunds Website, as average gas prices rise toward $4 per gallon, buyers are likely to consider buying vehicles other than traditional SUVs and, in droves, look at hybrids and small economy cars.

Higher Gas Taxes, or Not?

If you want to get people stirred up, just suggest raising taxes.

And if you really want to stir ‘em up in one quick hurry, suggest raising the tax on gasoline. And yet an increase in the tax paid for each gallon of fuel we buy is exactly what’s being advocated by some.

The thinking is that by causing fuel to cost more, people likely would drive less, and likely would transition into smaller, more economical cars, and thus would buy, and use, less of the stuff. If they did that, we’d reduce our reliance on imported petroleum and we’d reduce production of CO2, a contributor to global warming. We could, meanwhile, allocate the funds raised by such a tax to repairing, rebuilding and improving our nation’s transportation infrastructure.

Those all are laudable goals, most Americans probably would agree.

But here’s something else upon which everyone seems to agree: To introduce such a tax would bring about sure and certain retirement from whatever political office almost any gas-tax sponsor might hold.

Big Reasons for Small Cars

If you’ve been following along with the business, you’ve seen that a growing number of drivers are embracing smaller cars.

As you know, Toyota is a full-line manufacturer, with a set of wheels for pretty much every driver, no matter his/her needs or tastes.

But as you also know, we made our reputation as a purveyor of small, economical cars, and we have kept the faith. So as car buyers trend toward sub- compacts, small crossovers and midsize cars with four-cylinder engines, they’ll find that we’ve probably got what they’re looking for.

One primary motivation to pilot a small car hasn’t changed, from my college days until today. It’s gas mileage. Whether gas cost 35 cents a gallon, as it did when I was in college, or climbing toward (and perhaps past) $4 per gallon, as it now is doing, a tank that holds just 10 or-so gallons of this precious elixir, and an engine that carefully sips it like the valuable volatile it is, gets my attention.

More Than A Compact Truck?

I’m guessing that many of you Open Roadies have only seen the small bit of the A-BAT, a concept vehicle we debuted at the North American International Automobile Show in Detroit in January, and introduced to you in our first post about the vehicle, titled "Spotlight on Detroit: A-BAT Comes to Town," on January 15. We also showed the vehicle at the Chicago Auto Show, and now that the excitement has died down a bit, we thought we’d describe it in a bit more detail and seek your opinions about it.

The A-BAT – or Advanced-Breakthrough Aerodynamic Truck – is a highly flexible four-passenger compact truck that uses a unitized body, instead of the separate cab, cargo bed and steel ladder frame more usually seen in trucks of all sizes.

The A-BAT’s flexibility goes far beyond its unitized construction, however. First of all, it’s designed to be at home on dirt roads, city streets and Interstate highways. And more important, its motive power is provided by Toyota’s Hybrid Synergy Drive. That’s right, it’s a hybrid, so it’s got the low emissions and high fuel economy we all want.

Toyota and the Economic Weather

You’ve probably heard the gloomy prognostications for the economy in general and the car business in particular, but here at Toyota, we’re not so sure.

In fact, we’re pretty positive that while things like the sub-prime lending mess and the current low level of consumer confidence don’t bode well for the short-term outlook, in the somewhat longer term, things will look up.

And that, in fact, was the message I expressed to a gathering of automobile dealers in San Francisco on Feb. 11.

Most of my comments to that group were specific to the car business, but we think they will be of interest to most people whether they’re in the car business or not.

First of all, to use the language of the entertainment industry, it’s pretty difficult to ignore the fact that the economic good times the U.S. has enjoyed for the past decade are on a hiatus. But those good times aren’t gone forever.

We will recapture those good times, and I can give you some good reasons for this upbeat outlook.

IRV'S SHEET: Hybrid Tech: Parallel vs. Series

The term “Sustainable Mobility” is something we’ll be telling you more about in coming months. It summarizes Toyota’s ongoing multifaceted efforts to develop vehicles that rely not just on conventional sources of energy, but also on alternative sources of energy.

Note my use of the plural, sources. Sustainable Mobility involves research on much more than vehicles powered by our Hybrid Synergy Drive. It involves vehicles powered by fuel cells, by diesel, and much more.

But naturally it also involves our continuing development of Hybrid Synergy Drive.

And that’s what Toyota Executive Vice President Kazuo Okamoto was talking about during a presentation on the Challenges for Sustainable Mobility in Tokyo earlier this week.

We're #6 and going for Lego!

Toyota ranked number six in something?  Why would we be proud of that?

Well, simply because it reflects our placement in a ranking of 200 of the most respected corporations in the world--those whose customers and other consumers voted as having the very best reputations worldwide.  And while we won't shy away from striving for #1 in anything that reflects the fundamentals of our Toyota Way guiding principles, the results of a study of the world's most respected companies released last week by the New York-based consulting firm, Reputation Institute, tell us that our quest for continuous improvement and respect for all people is paying off .  .  . 

Toyota's Open Road

When I think of the open road, my thoughts turn to pleasant memories of weekend trips in my Toyota to destinations unknown, moving forward in a spirited manner with a sense of freedom, and the opportunity to meet new people and engage with them—listening to their stories and developing new friendships.

It was in this sense not long ago that I had the opportunity to commune in a most unusual way with a community group of some of Toyota's most loyal and passionate owners, members of the Prius enthusiast forum know as PriusChat. PriusChat is a great example of how Toyota is beginning to utilize nontraditional consumer-based and consumer generated media to reach out directly to owners and consumers and to shape and protect the Toyota brand image.

With over 13,000 active Prius members and who knows how many behind the discussion threads, it is the perfect spot to engage with our customers and those that we hope will become part of the Toyota family. A young man named Danny from Columbia, SC, founded the PriusChat internet forum nearly four years ago and has watched it grow dramatically as Toyota Prius and hybrid sales in general took off. But, Danny was missing one important ingredient, a Prius!

You see the guy was so frustrated with the very limited means for Toyota and Prius fans to get together and chat about their favorite cars, he built his own online community chat rooms and eventually established the Prius-specific enthusiast forum, PriusChat. Spent all his money on that and couldn't afford to buy a new car! But not any more!

With help from Grossinger Toyota/Scion North in the Chicago area, Danny and his fiancée and a small army of PriusChat members, including me, gathered at the dealership on a sweltering Chicago afternoon to launch Danny on his Prius ownership experience in PriusChat style, meaning plenty of Chicago dogs, burgers and Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream, members matching faces to screen names and an incredible display of Prius vehicles on site with visual displays, informative information and real live PriusChat members (owners of the cars!) handling questions from observers quite expertly.

So whatever we want to call this rapidly expanding consumer-generated media, it's all about the conversation along the open road, it's about listening to those who think your products rock as well as those who think they stink.  The venue isn't perfect, but it is instantaneous--and it does demand an uncompromised level of transparency and authenticity.  What a perfect place to unveil Toyota's newest corporate communications tool, the Toyota Open Road Blog.

And just like Danny and his PriusChat community, we hope that this blog will serve as our "Go and See" mechanism on the web as we open up the conversation to consumers, our customers, journalists, car aficionados and just about anyone else who longs for the exhilaration of traveling along the open road.

-Contributed by Bruce C. Ertmann, TMS Corporate Communications