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| The 2013 Volkswagen Jetta Hybrid whispers its green credentials rather than shouting them. |
The de-gimmickification (give me until this afternoon to make a Wikipedia entry) of hybrid vehicles has been a tricky thing. As we noted in our review of the Toyota Prius C, the vast majority of hybrid buyers seem to want to call attention to themselves. The "big" (compared to the Prius C) Prius has attained a good chunk of its best-seller status by being instantly identifiable as a "green" vehicle. Honda, a strong candidate for major player with the environmentally sensitive, has struck out with its hybrid offerings thus far, the Impact and CR-Z being too small to be practical and mainstream and the Accord and Civic hybrids having been virtually invisible...looking for all the world like regular Accords and Civics with "hybrid" badges on them...never mind what was under the hood and what wasn't coming out of the tailpipe.
So it's a huge surprise to this writer that Volkswagen, out to conquer market share in leaps and bounds, has taken the Honda Civic approach with the Jetta Hybrid.
