5th generation Prius.

[AJones]

Appears new Prius registrations were at least 3000 in 2022.

https://www.howmanyleft.co.uk/vehicle/toyota_prius_hybrid

But no doubt the low sales will have been a big factor in the decision, but then sales are dependent on the design and appeal of the actual product and the current Prius has some weaknesses, the front end design and styling is not attractive to many buyers, the acceleration isn't great and boot space in the PHEV is very limited.

The new 2023 design addresses all of those weaknesses, so has the potential to do a lot better. There's still a market for efficient saloons, look at the BMW 330e PHEV and the huge success of the Tesla Model 3. Given how company car drivers and salary sacrifice drivers are strongly pushed toward plug-in vehicles it is amazing how few Toyota have to offer

[Cs233]

12 hours ago, Paul john said:

Excuse my ignorance as a new member. But…

Why would Toyota bother with the uk market when less than 500 new registrations across the range (mostly bus ed) for the Gen4 prius hybrid were registered in 2022 (source howmanyleft.co.uk). Obviously outside of the enthusiast here it seems to have lost its appeal. 

The Gen 5 differs from the boring but durable Gen 4 model in every area. Like comparing apples and oranges I would suggest

[TonyHSD]

Gen 5 is not without design compromises and flows. Just look at the windscreen angle 📐, perfectly claustrophobic for many drivers and front passengers. , completely opposite to gen 4 designed, also not more aerodynamic. Another ugly stuff is the dashboard instruments cluster, like in their evs this design is horrible. I was in bz4x and couldn’t get myself to a position that does not restrict the view of the Speedo., same like many Peugeot’s . Apart from that not bad car. Ah, the price in uk would be close to Tesla model 3 which is insane. Very few will prefer to get Prius over Tesla, even just because of the name itself which is half half, either love it or hate it. 

[Cyker]

It's just typical of Toyota UK's apparent obliviousness to their customer base - They wasted effort trying to market the older Prius models to people who had no real interest them, then when they make one that even the automotive press is wetting themselves over (I never thought I'd see the day when so many people were raving about a *Prius*!!) they decide 'it's not aligned with what UK customers want' and decide not to sell it.

I really don't understand their thought process...

 

[APS]

18 hours ago, Cyker said:

I really don't understand their thought process...

It does appear a haphazard. Not that long ago they decided to start selling the Camry, Highlander and Corolla sedan. What's up there then? All models that we know don't do well in the UK - large and/or sedan/saloon. I applauded them at the time, just becuase they clearly wanted to go against the flow. Commercially though, you could argue it was wasted time and effort.

You'd have thought that they perhaps re-evaluate each revision of a product:  "Yes, Prius sales has stagnated and contracted. However, this model addresses several of the common complaints and may attach a new image to the brand. So, we will give it a shot."  - Nope.

I'd bet it's a decision based on some customer sentiment research they've done on the Prius brand.

[Cs233]

Ireland has a population of circa 5 million the UK around 70 million plus. Yet Ireland appears to be a market that holds better commercial options and as a result the Prius is offered. Equally in fact Toyota Ireland offers the consumer a larger vehicle range and where there is overlap with the UK vehicles are cheaper look at the Corolla pricing. Can we give Toyota UK a no confidence vote with how it is run...

[TonyHSD]

5 hours ago, Cs233 said:

Ireland has a population of circa 5 million the UK around 70 million plus. Yet Ireland appears to be a market that holds better commercial options and as a result the Prius is offered. Equally in fact Toyota Ireland offers the consumer a larger vehicle range and where there is overlap with the UK vehicles are cheaper look at the Corolla pricing. Can we give Toyota UK a no confidence vote with how it is run...

Well said and absolutely correct 👍👌

[BhxTrev]

8 hours ago, Cs233 said:

Ireland has a population of circa 5 million the UK around 70 million plus. Yet Ireland appears to be a market that holds better commercial options and as a result the Prius is offered. Equally in fact Toyota Ireland offers the consumer a larger vehicle range and where there is overlap with the UK vehicles are cheaper look at the Corolla pricing. Can we give Toyota UK a no confidence vote with how it is run...

Hi Carl,

It’s probably due to Ireland being part of the EU. Do you know if the new Prius is offered in all EU states which has a population of circa 450million? Certainly at present, I’m not looking at any other Toyota models & will probably be considering another marque, hopefully Japanese when I decide to change. 

[FROSTYBALLS]

Ireland is quite a different market to the UK. Sales volumes are substantially lower. Saloons are more popular there with the Corolla saloon continuing to be sold throughout the period 2007-2018 and was the best market leader for a number of years. Whereas for the same period, in the UK the Corolla was dropped in preference for the more popular Auris hatchback, van and Touring Sport.

An interesting article is the following from November 2022 - https://www.rte.ie/lifestyle/motors/2022/1117/1336726-the-end-of-the-road-for-toyotas-full-hybrid-prius/

Furthermore Toyota Ireland is a private, family owned company, probably with a different outlook to other Toyota importers.

[Cs233]

On 3/15/2023 at 8:23 AM, BhxTrev said:

It’s probably due to Ireland being part of the EU. Do you know if the new Prius is offered in all EU states which has a population of circa 450million? Certainly at present, I’m not looking at any other Toyota models & will probably be considering another marque, hopefully Japanese when I decide to change. 

EU countries that I have randomly checked seem to have the new Prius pending Trevor there may be some missing but generally it seems to be available in the majority at least. Completely agree when I replace the current ES model which is really too big for the current needs will likely look at Honda and potentially the Civic. In reality would have gone for the new Prius if available and with a price similar to the outgoing model.

[BhxTrev]

35 minutes ago, Cs233 said:

EU countries that I have randomly checked seem to have the new Prius pending Trevor there may be some missing but generally it seems to be available in the majority at least. Completely agree when I replace the current ES model which is really too big for the current needs will likely look at Honda and potentially the Civic. In reality would have gone for the new Prius if available and with a price similar to the outgoing model.

Hi Carl, 

Thanks for your reply. I guessed that it would be available in the EU, because of their larger population. As Japan drives on the left, as we do, I’d have thought Toyota would have had no trouble at least trying to sell the new Prius here. There wouldn’t have to be many alterations to the one selling in Japan. Ireland also drives on the left, so the Prius sent there would have been suitable for the UK market & were only just over the water so to speak, but there you go!

I’ve enjoyed driving my Priuses & found them to be very reliable. As I’ve said previously, I’m not ready to change my car yet but it won’t be a Toyota when I do because, certainly at the moment, there’s nothing they offer that I fancy. 

[GR KAIZEN]

On 3/18/2023 at 9:10 PM, BhxTrev said:

Hi Carl, 

Thanks for your reply. I guessed that it would be available in the EU, because of their larger population. As Japan drives on the left, as we do, I’d have thought Toyota would have had no trouble at least trying to sell the new Prius here. There wouldn’t have to be many alterations to the one selling in Japan. Ireland also drives on the left, so the Prius sent there would have been suitable for the UK market & were only just over the water so to speak, but there you go!

I’ve enjoyed driving my Priuses & found them to be very reliable. As I’ve said previously, I’m not ready to change my car yet but it won’t be a Toyota when I do because, certainly at the moment, there’s nothing they offer that I fancy. 

Hi all, another potential new Prius owner here and its a joke that Toyota GB PLC are opting not to sell the car in the UK.

There's lots of great posts here regarding why this is but I want to give my speculation to the most likely reason why Toyota GB are not selling the Prius in the UK.

Its due to politics, my guess is that they fear that the new vastly improved Made in Japan Prius will massively cannibalize sales of the UK built Corolla and with the future of the UK Factory that builds the Corolla (They also build the Badge engineered Suzuki Swace hybrid estate because Suzuki needed to get their eu corporate c02 ratings down..) in Derbyshire uncertain Toyota GB are politicking and flat out refusing new Prius in the UK market.

Toyota GB’s official reason for not selling the new car is because the ‘UK market is moving towards more suvs and they only sold 500 Prius in the UK in its last year’ which is a completely bogus reason.

The last gen Prius did not sell because of its morbidly offensive design and it didn't offer a big enough justification to buy over the cheaper competitively priced Corolla Hybrid with similar performance. The new Prius is in a different league now with its futuristic far less offensive looks, over 200bhp, 0-60 in 7 seconds, vastly improved interior tech, more upmarket build quality, ride quality improvements and almost 40 miles of EV range for the plug in prime!!

Also as a previous poster mentioned Toyota Ireland are selling the new Prius Prime and I assume they had the same ‘issues’ the UK market had with the old Prius selling in double digits in its last year on sale but as Toyota IE are still a family run importer they are free of Toyota GB’s politics and bureaucracy.

Its really frustrating because US reviews and customers are raving about the new Prius and there's a huge pent up demand for a ‘normal’ looking reasonably priced plug-in Hybrid car with 40+ miles of electric range that doesn't have the compromises of a pure EV.

I Wish someone back at Toyota HQ in Nagoya Japan would see there is a big demand for the New Prius in the UK and tell GB to stop politicking, get their act together and sell the car in the UK, let the market decide what car to buy.

It makes no sense to try to ‘protect’ sales of the Corolla because potential Plug-in Prius prime customers are not interested in any other car in the range and will just look at other manufacturers options instead!

[Cyker]

That's all good and logical, but TBH I think the dart just missed it in the Toyota UK Decision Making Meetings (Which often seems to involve them sticking items on a dart board and throwing a handful of darts over their shoulder at it to decide which ones to bring to market  )

 

[FROSTYBALLS]

36 minutes ago, GR KAIZEN said:

Its due to politics, my guess is that they fear that the new vastly improved Made in Japan Prius will massively cannibalize sales of the UK built Corolla and with the future of the UK Factory that builds the Corolla

Toyota Motor Manufacturing UK (TMMUK) is a totally different Toyota subsidiary to Toyota GB, which is responsible for sales within the UK.

Toyota GB has no control or otherwise over TMMUK.

Around the same time the decision was taken by Toyota GB not to sell the Prius, they also cut the Corolla saloon and the Camry due to low sales volumes.

Similar reasons around SUVs/crossovers affected the Ford decision to stop the Mondeo, the Fiesta and Focus. The Puma is now the best selling Ford in Europe.

[AJones]

1 hour ago, GR KAIZEN said:

Hi all, another potential new Prius owner here and its a joke that Toyota GB PLC are opting not to sell the car in the UK.

...

Its really frustrating because US reviews and customers are raving about the new Prius and there's a huge pent up demand for a ‘normal’ looking reasonably priced plug-in Hybrid car with 40+ miles of electric range that doesn't have the compromises of a pure EV.

Yes it's a very strange decision, around 50% of new cars are bought by fleets and due to tax rates and environmental policies these are rapidly moving to EVs and PHEVs, currently Toyota UK offers a single PHEV, the RAV4 Plugin and a single EV, the bZ4X, which is a poor performance for a company that pioneered the hybrid and now lags behind the other major car manufacturers. While SUVs are popular, there's still a place for saloons and hatchbacks, Tesla Model 3 and the Polestar 2 have carved out a worthwhile piece of the UK market.

[Cyker]

I'm hoping the runaway success of the new Yaris would show them all that there is demand for small high-spec hatchbacks, and not just cheap small ones, but it is worrying with e.g. the Fiesta being pulled that we might be seeing the death of the small hatchback.

I *really* don't want my next car to be a jumped up hausfrauenpanzer, but virtually all new and upcoming EVs are exactly that!

 

[FreddoChoc]

Blimey the new Prius ups the game. Some of these features I've never heard of before according to the IRL site https://www.toyota.ie/models/prius-plugin/overview :

+Digital rear-view mirror with built-in cleaning system

+Driver & front passenger air ventilated seats

+Precaution Illumination (PI) on dashboard ambient light

+19" machined black alloy wheels (10-spoke)

+Power Back Door

 

Also funny how the Irish Toyota site where I gleaned the above from mentions for the new Prius only has a 3-year warranty/100k kms where in the UK for most (I'm guessing at most) models its 10 years/100k miles.

 

 

[Cyker]

In the UK, it is also a 3 year warranty (Was 5 when I got my Mk4!)

The 10 year thing is the 'Relax' warranty where, every time you service the car at a dealer, you get 1 year/10k extended warranty (But it doesn't cover as much stuff as the factory warranty), so it's not really a 10 year warranty

It's funny Ireland are getting the Prius 5 and UK isn't tho' - I wonder if we'll see a bizarre reversal, where people are importing them to the UK instead of the more usual other way around  

 

[FROSTYBALLS]

Toyota Ireland also has the Relax warranty -which is a service generated extended warranty.

[FreddoChoc]

Thanks for the clarification (I need to do more research) and on my part 100k kms is wrong, for Toyota IRL its 185k kms so about 114k miles.

 

[TonyHSD]

The review that I have been waiting for. 👍

 

[Harters]

23 hours ago, TonyHSD said:

The review that I have been waiting for. 👍

 

Yes , I enjoyed that yesterday. 

I always rate reviews from Thomas and he was very impressed with it. 

I thought interior was a bit ordinary for a Prius, but I think that is their idea, to appeal to the masses. 

Can't wait to see one in the metal when we go to the States in September, not that I will be going down the Irish import route 😄

[Flatcoat]

Hot off the Autocar press, the new Prius WILL be coming to the UK. No details of which models and drivetrains. It isn’t a car I personally would buy (doesn’t meet our need for hatch/estate and towing) but I do think this latest version looks great in photos. 

[FROSTYBALLS]

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/new-cars/toyota-prius

[Paul john]

2 minutes ago, FROSTYBALLS said:

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/new-cars/toyota-prius

Sorry review blocked by my Ad Blocker