My experience is so different from people who discovered Clarity PHEV by surprise (and by luck) after considering other hybrid cars. Here's my very long story:
I've been following Honda's alternative fuel vehicles closely for more than 30 years. I ordered my first Insight gas-electric hybrid in 1999 after seeing the Honda VV Hybrid Prototype at the auto show in Detroit. It took more than a year before the car, now named "Insight," showed up at my dealer.
In 2008, two years after buying my 2nd gen-1 Insight, I read about the Honda Clarity FCX, a hydrogen-powered car that some said cost more than $1 million each to manufacture. Jamie Lee Curtis got one, but I knew I'd never see one of those in my garage.
In 2011, two years after we bought a gen-2 Insight, Chevrolet came out with their ground-breaking plug-in hybrid (or, as they called it a "range-extended electric vehicle") with an all-electric range of 38 miles. I was very impressed, but being a long-time Honda stalwart, there was no chance I'd buy one. Friends of mine who bought gen-1 Volts continue to love them to this day. I wished that Honda would make a plug-in hybrid, too--I knew it would be better than the Volt, especially because the Volt came first. I wonder how many Volts Honda purchased?
In 2016, eight years after the Clarity FCX, Honda brought forth their second Clarity Fuel Cell car. It was exciting to see Honda take their hydrogen car a big step closer to mass production, but I knew it was a California-only car because only in California is there any kind of hydrogen-fueling infrastructure.
Then the Clarity Electric appeared in 2017--with its perplexingly paltry 89-mile range. With Tesla's battery-electric cars going hundreds of miles on a charge, why would Honda produce one that can't even hit the century mark? The answer, of course, was that the Clarity Electric is purely a compliance car that generates eco-credits that enable Honda to sell more gas-guzzling Pilots in California and Oregon. Honda priced the lease on this car so low that it was actually not a bad deal. If you don't need to go more than 89 miles in a day (and don't require a big trunk), this luxurious 5-passenger car can make sense.
But the really good news Honda delivered along with the announcement of the Clarity Electric was that there would also be a plug-in hybrid variation coming later. I started pestering my local dealer for more information, but I always had more information than they did because I spend so much time seeking it out on the internet while the salespeople weren't interested in what was essentially vaporware.
Finally, in November, 2017, Honda announced the Clarity Plug-In Hybrid would go on sale at the beginning of December. Of course, I knew about this before any of the salespeople at my local dealer, but they were willing to promise me the first Clarity Plug-In Hybrid that arrived. I was so lucky that the first one was painted in my color of choice, Moonlit Forest Pearl.
Now the part that might seem surprising after reading how eager I was to get this new car. I told my salesperson we would delay taking possession so the dealership could put our new Clarity Plug-In Hybrid in their showroom for a week to give other potential customers the opportunity to see this amazing new car in person (we did take it for a brief test drive first, of course).
I was disappointed in the reports from the salespeople. It seemed that almost nobody bothered to even glance at my Clarity. It seemed that only the car's color drew attention from visitors to the showroom. The only comments were from people asking if they could get a Civic painted in that color (which you can't--only the Clarity gets that Honda color). They didn't sell another Clarity for months. Sigh.
So we brought our Clarity home and 10 months later, on our first long trip, our Clarity PHEV visited a gas station for the first time. We love this car. It's everything I'd hoped for. OK, it could have been better looking, but I've come to embrace it's unique appearance--the rear wheel well never bothered me a bit, but I love gen-1 Insights, too.
Now I'm infected with the EV bug and my 70-mpg Insight seems like a gas-guzzler. I need an EV. I need a Honda EV, but Honda's not planning to sell their upcoming all-electric 2020 Urban EV (due to get a new name at the Geneva auto show this March) in North America. Sometimes it's so hard being a fanatic who's always looking over the horizon for the next big thing--especially when the next big thing is going to be available only to those who live over the horizon in Europe and Japan.
