Student Name: Goutham Maramreddy
E-Mail: gmaramre@bridgeport.edu (ID: 0897361)

Topic: Prius: Leading a wave of hybrids
Summary:
This case is about Toyota Prius car. The entire case includes about the Prius car from it’s origin and also apart from this it is also been mentioned about it’s competitors in the market and also about SUV models.
Honda was a successful company in the car market till 2000, before the launch of Prius. When Toyota launched Prius in the year 2001 the Honda sales started to fall down due to the increase in demand for Toyota Prius. The Toyota proudly announced that it was their hottest car that they have ever made. Prius car is a combination of dual efficiency of fuel and power. It has both the gas engine power and electric motor power which helps the car to accelerate heavy. It is a noise free and fuel economy car. The original Prius used to be dull and small with 144 hp and 70 from 4 cylinders and 44 from electric which used to result a mileage of 42 per gallon. The year 2004 is to be said as the luckiest year for Toyota as it launched it’s Prius in this year which really turned the fate of Toyota. It came out with a powerful engine and SUV interiors and also with a better mileage like 60 per gallon when compared to earlier. Though it’s sales were good in the market but on the other side it’s competitors increased and companies like Ford, Honda, Chevy, Hummer H2 gave a good competence to Prius. Also at one point of time when there was a heavy demand for Prius around 2003 the company was not able to supply the cars to the dealers in time, where the customers used to wait for six months for it to be delivered. During the period 2004, Toyota spent $40 million for advertising on TV and magazines and at the same period the gasoline prices began to hike from $2-$3 per gallon. This made a strong impact on all the vehicles and SUV models particularly. Later with many offers like price discounts and miles the companies planned to increase their sales in the market. Later Toyota introduced standard version in the Prius and stepped forward with an aim to reach their goal in sales of one million vehicles by the early 2010.(Armstrong & Kotler, 2011)

Answers: 1. Toyota Prius is really a good car. Some environmental factors affected the introduction and relaunch of Toyota Prius. The most important factor that affected the Toyota Prius is the hike in fuel prices from $2-$3 per gallon at one point of time. Though this is a good effect to the Prius, but it stood in the market facing all the competencies as it was releases with a powerful gas engine which was not found earlier in any other cars and also it’s fuel efficiency is very high per gallon such as more than 60 miles per gallon. Apart from this fuel, there is another thing which Prius faced that is Demand and Supply. It had orders from all over the world and was not able to supply them in time to the dealers, where the customers used to wait for six months for Prius to be delivered.

2. There are even some macro environmental factors that Toyota faced at it’s relaunch of Prius. The price hike in gas is one of the most important problem that is explained in the above answer(1) as it got increased from $2-$3 per gallon. The Toyota spent $40 million dollars during the same period for the advertisements in Televisions (TV) and Magazines. It made the changes in the price tags of the car $4500 increase to the old price tag of $20000. These situations lead the Toyota to hit a nail on it’s own head. Resulting in this later the sales of the big SUV’s like Expedition, Tahoe, Hummer H2 fell down significantly and the sales of the midsize cars gradually increased day by day in the market. But, facing all these kind of situations Toyota didn’t give up and continued it’s ways and the sales of the their cars like Camry, Corolla and Prius were even good during this period.

3. According to me, I feel that Toyota has a good marketing strategy. It has the worldwide market for it’s cars and also the cars from Toyota has a good name too in the market when compared to other models. It had been working to show their cars in an advanced stage when compared to the other models. At one point of time their mail focus was on the SUV’s. Their group co-ordination and team work was very good. Toyota has it’s own brand name in marketing their cars. Each and every car from Toyota has a good feedback as it is been manufactured in such a way. Toyota manufactures good fuel, luxurious and a less maintenance car and launches it into the market. A fine example is that Toyota standard can be observed in these cars such as Camry, Corolla and Prius. The feedback from the customers and their output itself shows their strategies.

4. GM’s marketing director, Ken Stewart says that” if you want to get a lot of hybrids on the road, you put them in vehicles that people are buying now”. No, I don’t agree with his statement. This is because, the hybrid car has it’s own brand value and when it‘s features are included in the normal midsize cars which people buy in more, then what about it’s price value. If the people come across increase in price then they surely think of buying that car or not. And also the GM’s company can’t give their cars to the people for loss if they include all hybrid features in the car and without increase in price. So, I would like to say that it is good to maintain the difference between midsized cars and hybrid cars.

Assumptions/Opinions/Issues:
I feel that it is good for all the companies to have a clear idea what the public is expecting from them and how to produce them and in which better way to produce.

Recommendations:
What I feel is if all the cars companies have an clear idea (assumptions) on all the spares, raw materials and also forecast on some of the products like gas, e t c it would be better as these are the products which their cars need to used later on after entering into the market.
So, I can say this to all the manufacturers that it is good to have a clear idea about the products, which their products are going to use after coming to market (E g: Gas).

Lessons Learned:
We should not only have good luxurious cars (Products) produced from our plants, but also we need to have the forecast (how much to spend and when to release our output in the market) and also we should be able to feel the pulse of the customers.

Question for class:
It was said that Prius is the “hottest car in the united states” and it’s sales is very high, but I haven’t seen any Prius car for the past 25 days in Bridgeport and Detroit.

References:

Armstrong, G., & Kotler, P. (2011). Marketing - An Introduction. 10.