Edmunds Poll: Consumers Reject EPA 'Report Card' Label Proposal

Edmunds Poll: Consumers Reject EPA 'Report Card' Label Proposal

By John O'Dell September 13, 2010

We Send Results to EPA, Launch New Poll Seeking More on What Consumers Want

The EPA asked, and Edmunds' users responded, overwhelmingly rejecting the idea of using a letter grade, to rate new passenger vehicles for fuel efficiency and environmental friendliness.

The results of the poll - only 18 percent in favor of the letter grade, akin to an elementary-school report card except it wraps everything into a single grade and doesn't compare vehicles by class - are being sent by Edmunds.com CEO Jeremy Anwyl to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson.

The agency has been told by Congress to design a new window sticker label and last week issued two proposed designs and began soliciting comments. Edmunds took the opportunity to ask our users how they felt about the two proposals.

Among their comments was this one in favor of the letter--grade label: "If changing consumer buying habits is one of the goals here, then the 'letter-grading version' will be more successful.

"Opponents, however, said things like:

• "Having a giant letter grade will influence buyers too much. Auto companies will start making incredibly fuel efficient cars to get an A grade, which is good, but the over-all quality of the car itself could be lowered," and;
• " I prefer to interpret the numbers myself. A letter grade does not reflect my complete view of the product with all things considered."

In his letter, Anwyl points out that 82 percent of the 376 poll respondents said they favored the agency's second option for a new window sticker label - one that elaborates on the existing label's effort to communicate estimated fuel economy and fuel costs.

"Comments generally stressed the more comprehensive design of the second sticker, although there also seems to be a viscerally negative reaction to the notion of a letter grade," Anwyl wrote to Jackson. 

Pool respondents were voting against the letter grade label as much as they were voting for the second option.

He urges Jackson and her team to use the congressional mandate to redesign the fuel economy label "as an opportunity to think more broadly" and design a sticker that supplies comparison information that reflects how consumers shop for vehicles today versus the 1970s, when the sticker was first required.

Back then, consumers drove from dealer to dealer, asking questions and getting brochures and the window sticker played a useful role as a provider of information at the point of decision. But today, consumers largely make decisions about which vehicle to buy before visiting the dealership

"EPA can add huge value in providing the standards behind the data that ensures apples-to-apples comparisons," Anwyl wrote in his letter to Jackson. "This data needs to cover all vehicles and allow cross-category comparisons. It should also be clear what the data does not cover," a list that would include things such as the environmental impacts of manufacturing and transporting the vehicle to the dealership.
 
Edmunds has long criticized the proliferation of confusing comparison points promulgated by government - "the mess today where we have MPGe, CAFE, city, highway and combined figures all being bandied about," Anwyl wrote.
 
He suggests that a new EPA window sticker could help consumers cut through that "mess" by expressing comparisons in terms of monthly fuel costs. Among other things, that would enable people to accurately compare the impact on their pocketbooks of conventional versus hybrid versus all-electric vehicles.

"Most consumers do not think in terms of annual budgets," Anwyl wrote in his letter to Jackson. "We find that consumers care about emissions and MPG but generally make commitments based on costs. This is probably the single data point that is most easily comparable and as such will play an increasingly important role in a consumer's decision-making."

Anwyl discusses the window sticker issue in detail in his blog, and Edmunds.com has published a followup poll - please take a moment to respond! - in order to  get more detailed feedback on how consumers feel about the fuel economy labels.

John O'Dell, Senior Editor

John O'Dell:  is an AutoObserver Senior Editor. Follow @AutoObserver on Twitter.