Chevrolet’s name has always been affixed to some of the best-selling automobiles in the United States. But for some reason, when General Motors dropped the Geo make and started selling Geo Prizms as Chevrolet Prizms, Prizm sales dropped by about 66 percent. Even though the Chevrolet Prizms are the newest Prizms, I see more of the previous-generation Geo Prizm on the road.
Then I saw two Chevy Prizms in the same week. This one appeared in my neighborhood, with its faded paint, rust, and missing wheel covers. A beater if I ever saw one.
Then I found this one in a parking garage, looking nearly showroom fresh. The owner stuck a Transformers badge on the decklid. I wonder what a Prizm would transform into.
I’m sure we all know that Prizms were basically Toyota Corollas. The first two generations were based on the Toyota Sprinter, which was a Corolla variant with unique skin. The Chevy Prizm was based on the E110 Corolla and looked very similar.
An excellent if not very exciting vehicle. Wish I kept my 1998 Prizm for a few more years!
I’d like to find one like either of these here in New England. ‘Most everyone else’s “rusty, wheel-cover-less beater” is our desired but often unobtainable daily driver, since rust destroys so many otherwise serviceable vehicles. I have no desire for anything newer or more sophisticated than these, but almost anything that will pass inspection up here is at least ten or more years newer with all that unfortunately implies. Should been born south of the Mason-Dixon line I guess.
GM were terrible in taking advantage of its own products. The global GM Vectra would fit perfectly as a new 2003-2011 Chevy Prizm in US. In person the Vectra is sort of a GM Corolla, it is humble, very sturdy, long lasting, kinda attractive and pretty easy to repair.
Part of what drove the Prizm was the joint venture between GM and Toyota that resulted in one plant in the US and one in Canada. GM wanted to learn Toyota’s ways and Toyota wanted manufacturing capacity in North America.
My Grandmother purposely bought a Geo Prism, then replaced it with a Chevy Prism, for two reasons: they were a Toyota, and there was a Chevy dealer close by. They had avoided Chevrolet since the 1980’s era Chevy wagon my grandfather had purchased, and then had to use the new to PA lemon law.
She drove it from 2003 when purchased, till we convinced her that she should no longer was fit to drive anything anymore about two years ago.
Sturdy,long lasting, easy to repair; so few (affordable) cars sold in the USA could be described that way.
My friend bought one very used serval years ago and it served him well for a few years as a second car. I wonder which cars lasted longer, Prizms or Corollas. Being practically mechanically identical, save maybe different parts suppliers, I imagine it would have come down to the owners.
Stereotypically one would expect Toyota owners to take more care and perform maintenance on schedule whereas buyers of lesser Chevy vehicles tend to treat them as disposable.
The same question would apply to Matrix/Vibes…
Ever observant of details, I notice the green fire hydrant. Is that a practice in your part of the world?
I grew up being used to yellow ones, but lately I have seen them red around here.
Besides being home to one of Hershey Canada’s chocolate factories, the town of Smiths Falls in Eastern Ontario, was well-known in the 1970s for its fire hydrants painted as faces. As a kid, I loved visiting the town, as all their hydrants were cheerfully painted. As different faces, and characters. Really added a whimsical feel to the entire community. I believe they switched to yellow in the ’80s, for safety/consistency. It was a very memorable touch at the time.
https://www.google.ca/maps/@44.8979361,-76.0208252,3a,75y,310.93h,98.18t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s1CIHEHlrZCnt-3HRGlQOYQ!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?hl=en
The color says something to firefighters about water flow, I guess.
https://www1.wsrb.com/blog/is-there-meaning-behind-the-color-of-a-fire-hydrant
A good friend of mine had one (Chevy branded I believe and not Geo). He and I started the police academy at the same time, so we rode together to/from the academy and the nearly 5 hours it took. I normally drove for some reason and I didn’t want to take my (then brand new) 1996 Ford Mustang to a college town, so I picked up a clean but high miles Dodge Aries K-car. That thing ran like a champ and never missed a beat. Not bad for an $800 purchase! He drove 2 or 3 times over the 12 week course and like I said, he had the Prism. It wasn’t a bad car at all, but I honestly preferred taking the Aries for the better comfort and it was a little more quiet. But then too, maybe it was because I didn’t really care for his driving as he liked to drive too fast.
The old Aries did a fantastic job for those 10 or so weeks I drove it the 5 hours each way. It was great in the snow too. I drove it for the remaining winter while the Mustang was tucked into the garage. Once spring was there and the snow was gone, I put the Aries at the end of the driveway for sale. Sold it in less than a week for more than I paid for it.
I’d love to know the mileage of the red car. Wouldn’t be surprised if it is in excess of 300,000. I’m also wondering how many different people have had it as their “first” car. I’ve lost track of how many people have said to me, “Oh, you have a Prizm? My first car was one of those.”
I never realized that Prizm sales dropped so much when they were rebranded as Chevys. Make the Geo brand wasn’t such a bad idea after all.
And I agree with what Mike said above — I knew several people who had one of these as their first car (or their first new car). Savvy people got the Prizm, knowing it was a Corolla, but could be bought cheaper.
This is what I’ve been saying for years. The FWD Chevrolet Nova didn’t sell very well, although it was basically an FWD E80 Corolla, and the Chevrolet Prizm didn’t either. The Geo version never matched the Corolla in transaction prices or residuals, but when the E90 Prizm arrived, it got a lot more attention than the Nova had. There was a fair bit of resentment toward the Chevrolet badge among buyers in that class — certainly, past experience with a Citation or Chevette wasn’t a selling point to buyers looking at a Corolla or Civic in 1988–89.
In the zoomed-out view, yes, but the Prizm was built to lower specifications. A different brand of a cheaper alternator on the Prizm, for example, and bolts; brackets, and hardware on the Prizm got cheaper, less-corrosion-resistant surface treatments. Look more, find more differences. Look still more, find still more.
A little bit, but not so much that most people would notice, at least with the E90 version (a car my family owned and that I had a lot of experience with). Some of the interior trim was a little cheaper — not that the E90 Corolla was necessarily lush — but the powertrain (Toyota 4A-FE and C50 five-speed) was pure Toyota in the best sense.
I remember this happening in real time. In the 80s GM announced that they were forming the GEO brand to offer import cars to appeal to people who were turned off by domestics. Then in the 90s they decided eliminate GEO and fold those cars back into the old GM divisions. What’s in a name? When that name was Chevrolet in the 80s and 90s, now we know.
I’m quite familiar with these my brother had 2 Corollas of this era, my Grandma had a 99 Corolla which is now owned by my Aunt and Uncle and my driving school had a bunch of Prisms
Had one of the very first built 1985 Chevrolet Novas. It lasted 10 years for us. The interior plastic colors faded. It was a good car. We outgrew it. Traded it in on a Previa minivan. The service writer at the Chevy/Toyota dealer had taken the NUMMI tour in California and told me the production line split in two: one line did Toyotas, the other Novas. Y’all note the NUMMI factory is now owned by Tesla.
“NUMMI”?
Yep, NUMMI.
The Geo/Chevy Prizm always looked to me like it was styled by and for people who didn’t like or understand cars very much. It was as ‘meh’ as a car could possibly look, like something Ralph Nader or Consumer Reports would design. The Corolla wasn’t exactly a stylistic tour de force, either, but next to the Prizm, the Corolla looked good.
While it’s true that the Toyota underpinnings meant the Prizm would be long-lived (way longer than any domestic GM product), I just can’t imagine a more boring vehicle. Of all the NUMMI cars, the Prizm is the one I like the least. Even the NUMMI Nova and Pontiac Vibe were better. Much better.
Frankly, about the only thing the Prizm has going for it over, say, a Geo Metro sedan is that the Prizm is a NUMMI vehicle, while the Metro is pure Suzuki Swift (aka Cultus).