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Remember the Honda Civic hybrid? No? It predated the Prius and looked exactly like a Civic. The first generation Prius looked pretty normal, too. It wasn't until the second generation Prius, with its radical styling that announced it was a hybrid, until it took off.



Prius came first (introduced in 1997), then came the Honda Insight (1999) - the Civic hybrid rolled off around 2001.

2nd gen. Prius was introduced 2003, but sales only picked up around 2005 < https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Prius >. The design wasn't the only factor - I would say Toyota's marketing and rising gas prices contributed too < http://zfacts.com/gas-price-history-graph >.




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