Hybrid Car Review

Hybrid car sales were up 46% for April, 2008, pushed by double digit percentage increases from the Prius, Civic Hybrid, Camry Hybrid, RX 400h and Altima Hybrid. GM hybrid vehicle sales are not broken out. Mazda Tribute sales are also not counted. This, in a month when light vehicle sales were down by 6.8 percent from last year. April's total was the poorest for that month since April 1995. Demand for cars, and especially smaller and/or more fuel efficient cars was up.

Toyota set the stage once again, selling over 32 thousand hybrid vehicles, a 53% increase from last April. That also means 4 out of every 5 hybrid vehicles sold in the US in April had a Toyota or Lexus badge. The Prius, alone, accounted for over half the hybrid car sales. The Camry was the second most popular hybrid, while the Highlander Hybrid was fourth.

To make the point, note there were, according to autonews, 1,248,649 light vehicle sales in the U.S. in April. 21,757 of those sales were for the Toyota Prius. Which means, the Prius made up 1.7% of the total vehicle market.

Honda increased sales over 50% for the Civic Hybrid, while the Insight and Accord (both retired) continue to fall off the map.

Nissan increased sales by 66% for their limited release Altima Hybrid, which is only sold in eight states. Ford is the only company to show a decrease in hybrid car sales, with the Escape/Mariner hybrid falling 16%. Ford cumulative sales are also down for the year so far by 8%.

Overall hybrid car sales are up 20% for the year so far to 122,917 units sold this year. U.S. light vehicle sales are down 7.7%.

Make	Model	Apr-07	Apr-08	% Change
Honda	Accord	318	25	-92%
Honda	Civic	2,855	4,324	51%
Honda	Insight	2	0	-100%
Toyota	Prius	13,056	21,757	67%
Toyota	Highlander	2,394	2,578	8%
Toyota	Camry	4,410	6,678	51%
Toyota	GS 450h	174	82	-53%
Toyota	RX 400h	1,384	1,624	17%
Toyota	LS600hL	0	122	-
Ford	Escape/Mariner	2,275	1,907	-16%
Nissan	Altima	483	801	66%
Total		27351	39898	46%
Make	Model	Cumulative, 2007	Cumulative, 2008	% Change
Honda	Accord	1263	168	-87%
Honda	Civic	9375	11646	24%
Honda	Insight	3	0	-100%
Toyota	Prius	52738	64666	23%
Toyota	Highlander	8597	8898	4%
Toyota	Camry	15687	21479	37%
Toyota	GS 450h	682	288	-58%
Toyota	RX 400h	5349	5553	4%
Toyota	LS600hL	0	452	-
Ford	Escape/Mariner	7732	7132	-8%
Nissan	Altima	1151	2635	129%
Total		102577	122917	20%

This was the second biggest month for hybrid car sales. The biggest month was May of 2007, so I'm unsure if we'll see an increase next month. Given that demand is outstripping supply right now, it may be unlikely we'll see an increase next month from last year.

Update: About five minutes after posting this I finally found an update on GM sales. According to TAC, GM had over 1,100 hybrid vehicle sales, with over 500 two-mode hybrid sales (Tahoe and Yukon hybrid sales). Which means there were over 500 sales of the Vue and Aura hybrids. That would be quite a huge jump for those two mild hybrid models, while indicating there was no growth in the Yukon or Tahoe sales.

GM had been having issues producing the Vue and Aura Green Line due to a recall on the hybrid battery pack. The battery packs to replace the vehicles being recalled were pulled out of the production line, forcing the numbers being manufactured way down.

See also: Hybrid Car Sales, March 2008.