EVERETT – Buzz Rodland pointed out a brand-new 2007 cherry red Prius in his sales lot at Rodland Toyota, the only one at the Everett dealership on Thursday.
“We always try to have one in the showroom, but the velocity of this car’s sales is something right now,” he said.
In fact, the Prius – first sold in the United States in 2001 – is outselling the popular conventional Camry sedan so far this year at Rodland Toyota and in the automaker’s five-state Northwest region. Buyers of the car with both gas and electric motors have various motivations, Rodland said.
“It’s the extreme gas mileage of the car and the emerging thing of people wanting to do the right thing,” he said.
At Klein Honda further south on Evergreen Way, the hybrid version of the Civic makes up nearly 15 percent of the total Civic sales, said Lin Loya, that dealer’s general sales manager.
Sales of hybrid vehicles are increasing faster than gasoline prices. In March, sales of hybrid vehicles reported to Autodata Inc. totaled 34,637 nationwide, up 94 percent from a year ago. That doesn’t count hybrid vehicles sold by GM, which doesn’t release those figures.
In addition to Toyota, Honda and GM, hybrids are available in the U.S. from Ford and Mercury and Toyota-owned Lexus.
Toyota’s Prius and Camry hybrid, which represent 70 percent of total U.S. hybrid sales, had an especially strong month in March.
On April 1, the federal tax credit for those who bought the Prius was slashed in half, which no doubt contributed somewhat to the March sales rush. But sales of Honda and Ford hybrids also posted double-digit percentage increases, even though tax credits for those vehicles remain the same.
One who’s noticed more Prius cars on the road are Doug and Pat Cavit of Silvana, who bought a Prius several years ago. They now have nearly 69,000 miles on it with “zero” problems, Pat Cavit said. They’re averaging about 50 miles per gallon.
“It’s really quiet, which is nice,” Pat Cavit said. “It’s also very roomy for a car its size.”
Colin Miller, a Rodland salesman, said customers also are attracted by the car’s high resale value and the high satisfaction rates reported by Consumer Reports.
“It’s not necessarily those who are calculating the dollars and cents they’ll save on fuel over five or six years who are buying this,” Miller said. “But people who are environmentally conscious and worried about what’s going on.”
Rodland, who began working at his family’s dealership in the 1960s, said he thinks the hybrid vehicles are a sign of where the auto industry is headed.
“We see the industry electrifying,” he said.
He said Toyota seems to be moving toward vehicles that switch to electric power when running under 25 miles per hour. He also wouldn’t be surprised to see the company offer a plug-in electric vehicle in the coming years.
In the meantime, Pat Cavit said she’s happy to see fellow hybrids on the highway.
“I think it’s great,” she said. “The more people that are driving them, the better for everybody.”
Reporter Eric Fetters: 425-339-3453 or fetters@heraldnet.com.
As of Thursday, the average price for a gallon of regular unleaded fuel in the Puget Sound area was $3.15, according to AAA’s daily tracking service.
Most stations in Snohomish County are charging at least that. The regional average price tracked by AAA is up by 30 cents from a month ago.
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