Toyota Resorting To Fire Sale Tactics To Reverse Negative Sales Trend

A few more facts:

Toyota sat on old designs counting on a fabricated reputation to sell them at a premium.

Toyota vehicles are currently the subject of numerous recalls and safety investigations. The average Toyota is quickly proving to be no more reliable than the competition and possibly more dangerous.

Toyota vehicles are typically more expensive than the competition and when the consumer takes in the above two points they shop elsewhere.

If recall visits to the dealer were counted as a reliability factor by JD Power, Toyota could be at the bottom of the reliability list. After all a visit to the dealer for a repair or a recall is the same thing.

009 at his best!

I know you appreciate good work. Beside the article says it all, Toyota is going to have to dig deep in the coffers to get out of the hole they dug for themselves.

If the article says it all.....why are you regurgitating it?

News is news.

And its news that Toyota is having to increase incentives in order to move the metal.

I do wonder how it will affect resale in the long term.

Toyota sells very good to excellent cars in terms of quality, but the designs are getting old. Also their cars are expensive for middle class folks, so if incentives will help, why not ? They are still less than other brands. Speaking to owners of their newer sedans/SUVs, I would say they are still very reliable and excellent value.

lol Toyota expensive. No comment on quality :) I'll respect your opinion. But I won't agree with it.

Joe - I believe he means they are expensive compared to the competition. They have always effectively been able to tout the reliability factor as a justification for the add cost. Not so much now.

Fantastic article - love the photo. And Recall King Toyota just chimed in with yet another recall today of 136,000 cars for software problems. I sure wish Toyota would 'fess up and recall their 2000 thru 2002 MR2 Spyders. Engine failures galore: http://tinyurl.com/clm2uw

I know I tease 009 a lot for his bias but in this case, I think he's spot on. And I'm fully aware that US car companies use this "fire sale" tactic more than Toyota/Honda in the past but the fact that Toyota now uses the same has to reflect the market's adverse reaction to their cars. Now whether the market is buying less Toyotas is due to 1) questionable maneuvering to hide potential defects 2) parity in quality with other car makers 3) lame and uninspiring design/performance, etc. is a different matter but the fact is the market sees Toyota as comparable (rather than superior) to other companies. More important than how the market now sees Toyota is how Toyota itself considers it to be more comparable (rather than superior) to other companies in order for them to implement the same business practice as those companies.

Well if it is billed as a fire sale exactly how much money are they dishing out?