Prius sales on track to beat 2010 totals despite quake

Toyota Motor Corp., with as little as one day's worth of Prius cars on dealers' lots after the March earthquake , says sales of the hybrid will still beat 2010.

Asia's largest automaker is racing to replenish supply after the lack of inventory led to a 61 percent drop in Prius deliveries in the U.S. in June, to the lowest level since September 2004.

Almost half of Prius models are sold in the U.S., where the car accounts for more than 60 percent of hybrids sold since 1999, according to data supplied by automakers.

Prius, the company's No. 3 selling car after the Corolla and Camry, is the fastest-growing Toyota car this year, even with the quake-depleted inventories.

Demand for efficient autos has increased this year as fuel prices have risen. General Motors Co.'s Chevrolet Cruze was June's top-selling car in the U.S., and deliveries of Ford Motor Co.'s Focus rose 41 percent.

"Dealers simply cannot get their hands on them quick enough," said Ivan Drury, an analyst for Santa Monica, Calif.-based Edmunds.com, an industry pricing and data website. The model "is easily the poster child for inventory issues."

Production of Prius and two Lexus hybrids is rebounding faster than Toyota first estimated after the 9-magnitude quake in March. The company expects to be back at full output by September, rather than its earlier target of late 2011.

Even though Prius isn't among the automaker's most profitable lines, Toyota sees it as the best opportunity to win new customers in the next few years, said Jim Lentz, president of Toyota's U.S. sales unit. The nameplate will be expanded to include the Prius v wagon, Prius c subcompact and plug-in Prius.