Nissan, you’ve got some ‘splainin to do re: Leaf Canadian pricing
Exciting to see Nissan announce Canadian pricing for its Leaf electric car today. Disappointing to see that Canadians will have to pay more than $5,000 more than Americans at a time when the Canadian dollar is worth more than the U.S. greenback. What’s with that? I mean, a couple of thousand more, maybe I can see the reasoning. But having to pay $38,395 Canadian for the base model when you can get the same thing for $32,780 U.S. south of the border? That’s just a ripoff.
Nissan has to come up with a pretty good reason to justify the higher cost if it wants Canadians to buy in. Personally, I was interested in the Leaf until this pricetag shocker, so I may wait now for Ford to launch its Focus Electric in Canada. This seems like a brazen attempt by Nissan to soak up the generous $8,500 rebate being offered to electric car buyers in Ontario.
So, Nissan, what the dilio?
Tags: Nissan LEAF
Tyler Hamilton is editor-in-chief of Corporate Knights magazine and a business columnist for the Toronto Star, Canada's largest daily newspaper. In addition to this Clean Break blog, Tyler writes a weekly column of the same name that discusses trends, happenings and innovators in the clean technology and green energy market. This blog is a personal project started in April 2005. It is not an official blog of the newspaper.
March 29th, 2011 at 2:10 pm
Daytime running lights and a bilingual owners manual aren’t free, you know.
March 29th, 2011 at 6:02 pm
Have you checked whether the United States is offering different additional incentives? (Incentives that are included in the price, rather than rebated?)
But recently, cars in the United States have generally been much cheaper than in Canada. In this way, the cost difference on the Leaf likely isn’t special.
Car makers have figured out that Canadians will pay more, so, of course, they are charging more. Quite simple, really.
March 29th, 2011 at 8:23 pm
Socialism cost money y’know!! Health care isn’t free y’know!! Meet me at the pub and we can debate it over a cold one.
MrC
March 29th, 2011 at 8:44 pm
And what is the reason that a commodity that is traded freely across the Canadian – US border (Gasoline), is priced higher in Canada?
And to add insult to injury, there is an MP (and a website) that facilitates this cartel like pricing, by announcing every night next day pricing.
In Quebec, gas station owners were charged for phoning each other. In Ontario they don’t have to do it, since prices are pre-announced. In yet, no action at all from those responsible for anti competitive behavior.
March 31st, 2011 at 1:09 pm
Considering this thing is most likely going to be less appropriate for the Canadian climate than for the climate in many parts of the US, it looks like an even worse proposition.
Enoch, prices used to vary quite wildly in Ontario but, at that time, a lot of people were asking for more predictability — they were frustrated by wildly varying prices in the same city and also between morning and afternoon. That problem seems to have been addressed.
April 1st, 2011 at 5:16 pm
Obviously people in Ontario are different from anyone else in North America. They are clamoring for price fixing