Toyota Prius: A Niche Vehicle...Outselling Entire Brands

How would you describe the Toyota Prius? Do you consider it a mainstream vehicle, or a niche product with a fanatical (and hardly mainstream) following? What if I told you that the Toyota Prius -- by itself -- outsold entire automotive brands (that's all models added together) in the month of November. You'd probably say, "I'm sure the Prius did outsell some entire brands in November, brands like Ferrari, Maserati, Porsche and maybe even Jaguar, Land Rover and Hummer too."
Actually, it outsold all those brands...added together. But the Prius outsold some other brands last month, too. Brands you've probably heard of...

...like Acura, Audi, Buick, Infiniti, Lincoln, Mercury, Mitsubishi, Saturn, Scion, Subaru, Suzuki and Volvo. And guess what? At 16,737 units in November it was only the fourth-best month of 2007 for the Prius. Toyota sold 24,000 of these hybrids in May, 19,100 in March and 17,700 in June.
BTW, the Prius was 300 units away from outselling Cadillac in November, and less than 1,000 units short of outselling Volkswagen. I should also note that the Prius was Toyota/Lexus' third-best selling vehicle in November, beaten only by Camry and Corolla.
These numbers really shocked me (no pun intended), but they probably shouldn't. I commute on PCH twice a day, and I see a different Toyota Prius every few hundred yards.


Source: http://blogs.edmunds.com/karl/675