February 20th, 2007 I saw the above ad at AdverBox, because I’m a dork and I read websites about ads and marketing. Anywho, I found this particular ad to be fairly witty. Our political leaders always talk about breaking dependence on foreign oil, and it’s fairly obvious it won’t happen any time soon.

What is never talked about, however, is the effect this will ultimately have on foreign economies if our nation and others really work towards alternative energy sources. That’s why I love this ad. It’s very ‘fresh’ – a humorous twist on the global warming/energy crisis/environmentalism topic. The tagline is “unfortunate for some”. It certainly goes a long way towards making the Prius a political (and environmental) statement rather than just a car.

And frankly, given it’s current appearance, I think it’s a brilliant piece of branding from Toyota. Welcome! If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed.

Thanks for visiting! eNel says: February 21st, 2007 at 10: 22 am I love the sheikh’s pinky ring. Asshole says: February 21st, 2007 at 11: 15 am The most unfortunate thing about the Prius is it’s looks, what a turd on wheels.

Daniel says: February 21st, 2007 at 11: 18 am Indeed. However, that’s why I find this ad so interesting. The actual car is the smallest element on the ad. They’ve decided not to sell the car on it’s looks, or really any of it’s other features other than the gas mileage (and the political/environmental consequences of said gas mileage increase). And as we’ve seen, it’s working.

eNel says: February 21st, 2007 at 3: 18 pm Actually, I heard that since the tax credit dropped on the Prius, and more accurate MPG estimates have come out, there is a huge oversupply of Prius’s on Toyota lots… Daniel says: February 21st, 2007 at 3: 30 pm I think those factors, along with market saturation (the people who were going to get a Prius, for the most part, already have) are all valid. I’ve read the next ‘generation’ Prius is supposed to have much better mileage which will probably see another spike in demand. But for now, I think a lot of people are holding out.

For the price, the only real justification is the savings in MPG. So they have to push that aspect HARD. asshole says: February 22nd, 2007 at 1: 29 am I’ll have to find it again or do my own calculations but basically the “premium” paid on a hybrid would require you to drive over 120, 000 miles in order to reach a break even point on the MPG savings versus price premium over a comperable value car like a Chevy Aveo or one of the other matchbox cars. Daniel says: February 22nd, 2007 at 9: 48 am Yeah, I did the math on that once and it is well over 100k before you see an actual ‘return’ on your investment. That’s before you compute the economic and environmental costs of the creation and disposal of batteries as well.

I think that’s the reason Toyota is really pushing the environmental angle as hard as they can. From a pure economic standpoint, it’s a tough sell. But when you sell the ’sizzle’ rather than the actual steak, sales can be pretty strong.

Once the cost to produce these type of vehicles come down a bit, it’ll be a no-brainer, however. Cory says: February 23rd, 2007 at 2: 38 pm I found myself somewhat amazed to read the other day that the US is the 3rd largest oil producer in the world (behind Russia and Saudi Arabia which btw might effect US policy towards Russia). I looked up some numbers and sure enough, we’re number 3, and number 4 is a long way back. Apparently, due to variability in supply, there are some months here and there where the US is the biggest world producer of oil.

Another curiousity, is that due to our production, we are far less dependent on other nations for oil (percentage-wise) than some developed countries. For example, France, Germany, and Japan must import nearly all of the oil they wish to use. A disruption in supply for these countries would be far more catastrophic than for us. I wonder if the push for “energy independence” is a US phenomenon or something happening in these other developed countries as well The reason I wonder is that there is no solid economic reason for us to be energy independent.

The movement makes a lot of “what if” assumptions that aren’t any more reasonable than preparing for a nuke going off in your backyard which is to say, it could happen, but the chances are slim. Daniel says: February 23rd, 2007 at 3: 32 pm The only reason energy independence concerns me is it will go a long way to ending the cyclical nature of our foreign policy. We only care about the stability of the middle east because we have economic ties to the area, but a lot of the same instability is because we are in the middle east trying to stabilize (and in ways, control) it. I remember reading something about Canada trying to become energy-independent as well, so we’re not alone, but I think as you mentioned, not many countries would even be capable of doing so. Leave a Reply Posted on Tuesday, February 20t