Toyota’s Bad Day

The Truth About Cars ^ | June 1, 2009 | Ken Elias

[CSM]

It might be a bad day for GM but it’s a much worse one for Toyota. Really. The days (decades, really) of weak domestic manufacturers shooting themselves in the foot with bad design, poor assembly, and non-existent customer satisfaction in passenger cars are coming to an end. Toyota didn’t have to outrun the bear, it just had to stay ahead of GM, Ford, and Chrysler. Years of producing huge profits in North America hit the wall for Toyota in 2009, and they’re likely not to return. Ever. The game has now changed—and it’s not good for Toyota.

Thanks to US and Canadian taxpayer support, GM and Chrysler are about to get a new start. They’ll enjoy fresh balance sheets, with minimized legacy liabilities and serious money earmarked for new products. (The taxpayers are paying for Fiat to develop cars for North America; you didn’t really think that the Italians would take this risk on their own did you?) Ford, by dint of luck or smart management, borrowed what it needed years ago to make the transformation outside of court oversight.

By the end of this year, all three Detroit automakers will be restructured, resized to match production with demand, and re-energized. They will reenter the market as the lowest cost producers inside the U.S. market, with slimmer, trimmer product lines. These automakers are getting ever-closer to 100 percent capacity utilization.

Looking at product, Ford’s passenger car line up just keeps getting better. The 2010 Taurus looks hot, the Fiesta test drive campaign is generating good press with the Twitter/Facebook crowd, and a new Euro Focus will be here in a two years. Slowly but surely, more Americans are considering a Ford passenger vehicle. Its trucks still lead the category and will continue to do so. Better products, increasing quality, and slowly increasing market share is building FoMoCo momentum.

GM’s go forward brands—Chevrolet, Buick, GMC, and Cadillac—still have some vehicles that don’t cut the mustard with consumers. But the balance is starting to tip back towards the positive. The Malibu and Camaro represent some better efforts. The gorgeous new Buick Lacrosse might give the new Taurus a run for the money. Cadillac will extend the CTS line and bring a new SRX to the market shortly. The Corvette still leads the pack in dollar performance value. And maybe, just maybe, the Cruze and Viva will live up to GM hype machine.

GM’s perhaps two to three years behind Ford with its product development cycle. But it can now concentrate on fewer models. Recent successful launches suggest that GM just needs time to plug the holes for the weak sisters. It now has the money to do so and you can bet (if you’re taxpayer, you already have) that the efforts on fuel efficient passenger cars will receive the bulk of the dollar spend. GM won’t abandon trucks (no matter what Nancy Pelosi thinks) and volume wise, GM leads.

Chrysler can’t do anything under their new pasta-fed management until the re-tooled imports arrive here for production two years hence. Its cars still (mostly) suck, except for the higher-performance versions of its LX cars. But it isn’t going away and will still find some buyers for its products at the pace of the recent past. So this company will just hang on . . . and on . . . and on.

Now, stop and think about this. What has Toyota done for you lately? Is there one single passenger car from Toyota that excites you?

Let’s keep the new Prius out of this discussion for the moment; it’s not a car for drivers but techno-geeks and greens mostly with excitement provided by the fuel gauge, not vehicle dynamics. The Camry might lead the C/D class in sales for now, but will this continue? What happens when Americans actually consider a Malibu or Fusion-based product instead? In terms of design appeal, the Camry looks dowdy or boring (take your pick) and its reliability isn’t any better than the Fusion. Put a four-cylinder EcoBoost engine in that Fusion and Ford wins.

Go through the rest of Toyota’s passenger car line up and compare each vehicle to the current and near future offerings from GM and Ford. The question is: will Toyota customers do the same?

Toyota (or Honda) products have been the default choice. That “Easy Button” is starting to get harder to press for buyers. Yep, Americans will begin to come back to consider Detroit products (at least GM and Ford), and that’s not good for Toyota. And we’ve really never left Detroit for our big pickups and SUVs, whle the Japanese are still mostly playing catch up.

Yep, it’s a bad day for Toyota and a great day for America. You can look forward to a new Detroit that will be competitive, if not lead, in cars and trucks for mass market Americans. Count on it.

[rintense]

Toyota and Honda will likely benefit the most from all this. And Ford.

[numberonepal]

There’s zero chan[c]e I’ll buy a GM or Chrysler car in the next ten years, and probably ever.

Same here. I have never knowingly purchased a Pepsico product since the deal they made with the Ruskies. That was a long time ago and I still avoid their product line.

[Wyatt's Torch]

Found it on the Toyota Nation site...

[USCG SimTech]

Being government owned, they may also choose to compete using the tax code, legal code, etc

Exactly! Change the rules for all companies that are non-union is next in the works, I predict.

[HamiltonJay]

Sorry, but I agree with the author, their is no more boring car on the planet than the Camry, without question the most boring family sedan in the marketplace. Putting a few more folds in the sheetmetal doesn’t change it.

Give me Fusion anyday.

[HamiltonJay]

The Fusion is a great car, Ford has quietly and FINALLY been putting the quality and reliability that they’ve had in their full size vehicles into their passenger cars with stellar results. I do wish they would have moved the FOCUS to the new platform that Europe has instead of just putting new sheetmetal on the old one in the US.. but what can you do?

Maybe ford has finally figured out, put those cool stylish cars you’ve been keeping over in EU in the US and they may just sell.

[CSM]

“I do wish they would have moved the FOCUS to the new platform that Europe has instead of just putting new sheetmetal on the old one in the US.. “

It is coming......

[mrsmel]

I’m not a “car person”, all I know is that my Avalon, and my Camry before that, have been the best, most reliable cars I’ve ever had. I have never had a breakdown with either one, nothing ever goes wrong. And I get good enough mileage for the driving I do. Once when I went to my mother’s in Virginia from Mississippi, I got a little over 400 miles on one tank of gas.

[mrsmel]

Same here. Even if I didn’t already like my Toyotas anyway, I wouldn’t buy GM on principle.

[mrsmel]

He must’ve been paid by the Slick Barry administration to write this propaganda.

[ALPAPilot]

Do you have any more info on that or know of any websites that have chat rooms for solving any of those problems?

[Thorin]

It’s enjoyable reading an article not filled with hatred for American manufacturers for a change.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks to US and Canadian taxpayer support, GM and Chrysler are about to get a new start. They'll enjoy fresh balance sheets, with minimized legacy liabilities and serious money earmarked for new products. (The taxpayers are paying for Fiat to develop cars for North America; you didn't really think that the Italians would take this risk on their own did you?) Ford, by dint of luck or smart management, borrowed what it needed years ago to make the transformation outside of court oversight. By the end of this year, all three Detroit automakers will be restructured, resized to match production with demand, and re-energized. They will reenter the market as the lowest cost producers inside the U.S. market, with slimmer, trimmer product lines. These automakers are getting ever-closer to 100 percent capacity utilization.

Thanks grellis.

[erman]

Yeah, because every citizen in Michigan is somehow responsible for Goverment Maoters, and every UAW member is a thugocrat or bootlicker.

Up yours, pally.

free country.... live where you want. Yeah, you are responsible for the place you live. I've lived in Pennsylvania, California and on the water in Florida.... all because of training and jobs. Kids got old enough and I did want them to be raised where I mainly grew up. Texas. We've got our flaming libs and faux conservatives, but it's the last bastion for freedom. My kids say the pledge of allegiance to the Flag and the Texas flag, have prayed for our soldiers in school and met them, had Christmas decorations and most of the boys and girls they know have used a weapon to hunt or for plinking.

The thugocrats that run Michigan are immune cause enough nipple people and union thugs/bootlickers figured out a way to vote money to themselves and that's the end of the game. Cops, Firemen, teachers, all the bureaucrats that run the previous civil servants, the UAW and then the parasites..... all get their money from your pocket and keep draining the "corporate" devil.

What I hate is when yankees come down from sh#tsville or come east from Calish#tnia and whine about how backward and intolerant we are... and how all these great social programs "helped" where they came from... and how guns are "bad" and we shouldn't be killing murderers but "really punishing them with a life behind bars".

yawn..... as far as "Up yours, pally."... Ok... just keep living the Michigan Miracle or is it the Michigan Dream.

You all should raise taxes on corporations to 40% of the gross in order to "help the little guy" and punish the "fat cats"... bwahahahahahaha... yeah, do that. Raise some taxes.. oh... and sue somebody, that's the ticket.

Remember to bow to Dearborn where all the nice tall mosques are.

[webschooner]

Mr Elias, slowly now ... set down the bong, and if you can still walk, move away slowly ...

[grellis]

blah blah blah blah blah...hey, idiot, I don't give a damn where you've been, remember where you are, n00b. Free Republic is a conservative news forum. Freepers come from every state in the union and every corner of the earth, even those littered with liberals. Try to keep that in mind the next time you feel like insulting a bunch of us.

[CSM]

Some of us are willing to fight the fight instead of running scared!

How’s that for hyperbole?

[erman]

remember where you are, n00b

no you're the n00b

[Antoninus]

Is this guy kidding? Toyota will have no fear of "Government Motors." Soon they will be competing against the US equivalent of Yugo. And the result will be that GM and Chrysler's market share will plummet. They'll hang around because the feds and state governments will insist that all fleet purchases are of Government Motors' cars.

The Japs, Koreans, Chinese, Germans and Ford are licking their chops at the opportunities this gives them to rack up market share.

[erman]

Some of us are willing to fight the fight instead of running scared!

How’s that for hyperbole?

I like that. Good luck. I hear Michigan is nice in the summer up in the upper peninsula. My only exposure was at Henry Ford Hospital and getting off one exit too early. The only reason I ever left Texas was for work related stuff till I had a nice job lined up and now I'm where I can at least fight the good fight.

We have libs here, but enough conservatives to tell them to f#ck off. They'll also never take our guns or ammo. I can't even remember the last time someone tried to pass "gun control" in Texas.