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Hybrid car technology that can stretch out a gallon of gas doesn't do much for Judy Beissel of Sauk Center.

"That would be the last thing I would look at," the "60-plus-" year-old woman said even as she eyed a 2010 Ford Fusion hybrid at the Greater St. Paul and Minneapolis International Auto Show Sunday.

But her son Josh, 31, disagreed. He drove the family down to the show in his 2007 Fusion with a conventional engine and said mileage always is a factor.

"It has to be, today," he said, citing volatile gas prices and the scary economy.

So is the hybrid the car of the Now? Or the Maybe Later? With Ford and Honda launching new energy-saving hybrids this month and the industry looking at hybrids and other expensive energy-saving technologies to pull them out of the red, automakers are hoping it's sooner rather than later.

With gas under $2 a gallon and a sinking economy, sales of hybrid automobiles, along with all other cars, have been tanking. Even last year's sales were a disappointment despite high summer gas prices. Total sales finished down 11 percent from 2007, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

Ford this month is trying to fan interest in its newest hybrid, the 2010 Fusion, a mid-sized sedan the automaker says is the fully realized domestic hybrid.

The Fusion boasts 41 miles to the gallon in city driving and 36 miles on the highway, besting the Toyota Camry hybrid, according to Ford. The carmaker expects to sell 24,000 hybrid cars this year, about 10 percent of its total Fusion sales, said Tom Gee, Ford's manager of hybrid controls and strategy. By contrast, Toyota sold more than 46,000 hybrid Camrys last year.

"We think we've got a more than competitive product," Gee said Monday, visiting from Dearborn, Mich., where Ford is based. "We think we've got the best in class."

But the price of a 4-door Fusion hybrid, which began shipping March 16 from its plants in Mexico, start at $28,000, or $8,000 more than a conventional Fusion.

While Ford is taking aim at the Camry hybrid, the market leader is the Toyota Prius. The Prius has been rated at 48 mpg city driving and 45 mpg highway, with a price tag starting at $5,000 less than the Fusion. Honda's hybrid Insight, a smaller Prius-fighter, will start at about $20,000 and ship in April.

People who can afford to buy a car now might be wise to spend a few thousand more for a fuel-efficient hybrid "knowing that down the road, if the economy comes back, gas prices are likely to go up," said Ari Ofsevit, manager of the HourCar program, a car-sharing program run by the nonprofit Neighborhood Energy Connection in St. Paul.

He'd like to see Ford make a hybrid pickup truck, but Gee said a hybrid truck isn't in the cards, even though advocates have pushed for a hybrid Ranger to save the Ford Ranger plant in St. Paul, due to close in 2011.

Ford somehow has to draw customers like Eileen Roston, 63. The Plymouth woman said she loves her Jeep Liberty, which comes in handy for her job as a dog trainer, but she believes gas prices will rise again so she made a beeline to the Prius display to measure the hatchback. "This has the best gas mileage," she said.