Posted on Thursday 8 May 2008
With no end in sight to rising fuel prices, Americans more than ever are switching from fuel-heavy SUVs and sporty V8s to economical four-cylinder sedans and compacts. Fuel economy has quickly become the top priority for new car buyers and according to a new survey nearly eight in ten Americans (79%) would choose a car that was ‘greener’ rather than one that was more ’beautiful.’
The survey, which was run by university engineering group Challenge X and sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and GM, was based on the results of thousands of respondents who planned to buy or lease a car within the next two years.
The survey also revealed more than one in three Americans (36%) who are on the fence about buying a hybrid vehicle say the tipping point to seriously consider the purchase would be if fuel prices rose to $4 a gallon. Nearly three in four car buyers (73%) said fuel prices would influence their decision to buy a hybrid vehicle as their next purchase.
Some other odd statistics include nine in ten women (88%) saying they would rather chat up someone with the latest fuel-efficient car versus the latest sports car, and 80% of Americans saying they would find someone with the latest model fuel-efficient car more interesting to than someone with a new sports model. If only Toyota hurried up and released a hybrid sports car – then you could win everyone over.
With surveys like this it’s really important to consider exactly what questions were asked (eg, when gas prices exceed 4$ per gallon, will you consider a hybrid? vs What price would gasoline have to be in order for you to consider a hybrid?), how the questions were asked (yes or no answers are much worse than those that require evaluation on a 1 - 5 scale), who funded the research and who asked the questions. If they weren’t trained in marketing (engineers? for goodness sake, who let them out of the computer lab!?), it probably doesn’t count for much.
Americans will vote with their wallets. While this has indicated a swing towards more economical cars, this may be a short-term reaction and not a long-term trend. The big question no-one seems to be asking is: are people actually replacing their gas-guzzlers or are they merely supplementing their family ‘fleets’ with an economical car?
Surveys are skewed and B/S anyway.
I prefer design and performance over all else, the rest will follow.
roy I understand what you’re saying but this survey was done for GM.,. thats clearly stated. as far as GM is concerned, they dont care about what price of gas it would take for you to get a hybrid cause then most people wont give you an accurate answer when you let them decide. what would be the price of gas before you went hybrid? 8$ a gallon? thats the response i would expect from people on this site,.. people who love their cars… but thats not the truth. the truth is you’re already considering hyrbids right now.. and the more the price of gas goes up, the more you will too.
if you give people a barrier, say, 4$ per gallon,…. a barrier that GM must believe will be broken in say… the next 2 years.. which happens to coincide with their planned release of the Volt… then you start to see what they’re doing. they’re trying to figure out how big of a demand they should expect for the Volt. if you ask me, its 99% likely that the average pump price in the US will be 4$ per gallon before the end of the decade. thats easily seen.
GM can tell a couple things from this survey: given the projected gas price at the time of the Volts release, 79% of people wont even give a damn about the looks of the car, if it gets a combined 100 mpg over a 600 mile trip. those people who buy that car will be liked more than some one who were to spend that same amount of money on… perhaps a camaro (a similarly sized vehicle and in that same price range)…..
I think its a pretty smart survey. Really solidifies my view of GM’s desire to get the volt out.