Toyota poised to be top car seller in US, what's wrong with the Big 3

Great Debates
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Handy dandy linkage

According to the article through July Toyota has sold 520,991 cars in the US, 20,000 more then Ford and nearly 40,000 more then Chevrolet.

What is it about the Big 3 automakers that they can’t seem to understand what most car buyers want. This discussion doesn’t include sales of trucks, where the Big 3 still hold a fairly large lead, but rather what has traditionally been a stronghold for the Big 3 namely the traditional car market.

Toyota/Lexus, Honda/Acura, Nissan/Infiniti routinely get higher scores on customer satisfaction polls and are regular J. D. Power Award winners for customer satisfaction and quality.

It seems like the Big 3 have given up trying to lead in the mid/full size sedan segment, as Ford is cancelling the Taurus and GM is simply giving the Malibu a name change and slight re-working.

What is it about the Big 3? Are they simply after profits, hence their attention to the SUV side of the market. Why don’t they seem to care about quality?

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My opinion, based on rumor, slander, and my memories of a 1991 book called “Who killed America?” by Paul Weaver, who worked for Ford during the Pinto debacle, is that historically, the big three tend to rely too much on their political and advertising clout and not enough on strict capitalist competition to stay ahead. Instead of trying to beat out the competition by building a better mosetrap, they have relied on new advertising concepts to keep pushing the same old crap, and favors from Washington friends to try to erect maintain trade barriers.

Every time I personally have gotten behind the wheel of a car designed by Detroit, I feel like I’ve been had. The steering, engine noise, and handling are all very “off” to me, compared to the Swedish and Japanese cars I have driven. My own experience is that your average American-designed car is simply an inferior product.

Now with the rise of the popularity of SUVs, Detroit is using its marketing ability to cover up the flaws in the same old designs. Evidence of inefficiency in the engine can now be promoted as the “power” and “muscle” that make SUVs worth the hefty price tag and gas bills, at least to the diseased minds that buy them year after year.

If the traditional Bush financial disaster continues, I predict a slip in the number of new SUVs sold, particularly American SUVs.

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Well, before I go any further, please be aware (my American Doper buddies) that I personally own a Lexus ES300 and a 1966 Shelby Mustang Fastback. It’s a really interesting thing to be able to compare the various pros and cons between the two cars. Also, I used to own a really wicked Alpina 2.7 litre 323i (the original body shape) and that thing was a little rocket but not very comfy for a 6’1" guy like myself.

Anyways, my observation of the Lexus (which ultimately is a super duper glorified Toyota) is that they (the engineers and design team) really, really spent some serious time on things like quality control, and noise suppression etc. The build quality in that car is just extraordinary - and even though it’s 8 years old now - there’s no way I’ll be selling the car anytime soon. It’s just too much of a perfect watch, if you know what I mean. The engine (according to the owner’s manual) is designed to last for 500,000 kms if you perform proper, regular oil changes on it. You only have to change the spark plugs every 100,000kms. It is so quiet when it’s idling that sometimes you can’t even hear anything if there’s ambient noise outside.

So, in my considered opinion, in the early 90’s the Toyota people in particular recognised that they were never going to win the “cachet war” - that is, the sheer prestige of owning say, a Jaguar, or a Benz, or a BMW. Part of that is linked to the generational awareness which is passed down from parent to offspring. The Europeans have been pressing the “cachet buttons” for some 30 years now and they really have a market awareness thing happening which is very hard to overcome. For example, BMW’s war cry of describing their cars as “The Ultimate Driving Machine” - which in reality is very hollow claim - after all, well over 50% of all cars sold by BMW are their low engine sized 3 series, and 3 series compacts - which really aren’t the ultimate in driving machines if you ask me. But such is marketing.

Anyways, both Toyota and Honda really worked super duper hard on pushing the “quality and reliability” aspects of their engineering campaigns it seems to me - and the results now are showing up in the sales figures.

And yet, I look at my 66 Fastback Mustang and I simply elicit a low “grrrrrrrrrowl” every time I look at the car. Man, by today’s standards, that Mustang is just so incredibly crude in terms of engineering. And yet, it’s the car which turns heads absolutely everywhere. Partly because it’s undergone a full ground up restoration, and mostly because it’s just such a timeless, gorgeous car to look at.

But you know, there’s a lineage issue involved as well. For a long, long time, the US Big Three had the entire American market all to themselves - with little need to pour much money into R & D - particularly in the field of mass production quality control. And I honestly believe that THAT is where both Europe and Japan (and to a far lesser extent here in Australia too) well, THAT is where the US Big Three have fallen behind. The incredible efforts which have gone into refining the actual manufacturing plants is where the real increases have manifested themselves for mine.

I like to refer to the Big Three’s manufacturing principals as a classic case of “boiling frog” syndrome - that is, if you throw a frog into a boiling saucepan of water it’ll do everything in it’s power to save it’s own life, but if you let the frog swim happily in comfy luke warm water and then slowly turn up the heat, that same frog will be far less concerned and worried and won’t notice that things are getting very dangerous.

Well, that’s the analogy I draw between Toyota overtaking the US Big Three - the culture which existed all these years - the entrenched workplace practices with Union demarcation lines, the acceptance by the US public to “believe” that that US made cars were as well built (overall) as Japanese made cars, the inertia within the upper echelons of the Big Three corporate management to not pour massive R & D funds into improving US manufacturing standards - ultimately all of those factors have combined to create the situation we see today.

My only advice to my American friends is try not to be too jingoistic in your responses. Competition is a good thing. Down here in Australia the same thing happened 20 years ago - and Toyota was the same culprit at the time too. Our local manufacturers had the same choice - improve or perish. And the Federal Government led the way and apparently our locally designed and manufactured cars are now on a par with overseas cars and are very highly regarded. There’s a parallel there worth looking into for mine.

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I saw the headline but your numbers don’t make sense. Chevrolet is a subsidiary of GM so sales of GM cars should be higher.

Just a couple of observations from a car buff. I have a 2000 Saturn Automatic that gets 32 mpg around town and I’m working on an 88 Thunderbird Turbo Coupe. The Saturn does exactly what I want it to do. I looked at every car in it’s class and the only other car I would have chosen was a Ford Escort. I thought the Escort was superior to everything else but it was the last year for the car. Ford does not support older models so the Escort was eliminated. I liked the Civic except for the seats (instant backache).

The Turbo Coupe has an after market following so I can build it independently of Ford. When I’m done I’m going to extend an invitation to the CEO to show him how it would have run had Ford not abandoned the engine (they had a follow-up design that would have been great).

Without getting off topic, American automakers are not on life support just yet. They are producing the iron necessary to compete. I would like to see faster responses to warranty items. Anecdotal story: A friend of mine bought a new Honda accord and Honda replaced the tranny in 2 days BEFORE it failed. Her Husband’s truck (2 year old GM) needed a part and it sat at the dealer for a week.

Another story. A work cohort had a new Saturn Vue and the dealer couldn’t fix a leaking heater box over a period of MONTHS. Saturn lost all future sales from that customer. The car was traded for another brand. When you compare one company who replaces a TRANSMISSION (in advance of failure) in 2 days vs a company that can’t fix a leaking hole, it isn’t even a debate.

My personal experience is that all cars have an Achilles heal. How the customer is treated is a driving force behind the next sale.

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I don’t follow the industry, so I speak only from personal experience: I’ve owned three cars in my eighteen years of driving. All three were American: two Fords and a Chevy. And all three have been unmitigated pains in the ass, mechanically, plagued by bad brakes, transmissions, starters, pumps, body rust, and what have you. I’d like to support the domestic industry, but I give up; my next car will be a Toyota or a Honda.

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Just ask Preston Tucker and Eddie Rickenbacker about Detroit’s attitude. Both of them were put out of business by the other car companies because their cars were better than those currently being produced. Now, of course, the car companies can’t do that, and they haven’t quite figured out what to do. Boo Boo Foo, I think nailed the problem quite nicely, IMHO. The only problem is that the Big 3 over the years have managed to buy large chunks of stock in the various Japanese car companies (Mazda’s Ford’s bitch), so it’s possible that the skills the Japanese have at building cars (which we taught to them, BTW) will rub off on the 'Merkins, however, after reading All Corvettes Are Red I’m not optimistic that the Big 3 will learn anything. (Rumor has it that the quality of Mercedes has dropped since they took over Chrysler.)

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This doesn’t make sense.

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You’re correct, it doesn’t. The car exhibited a noise that indicated a known failure was about to occur. I don’t know the particulars, it may be part of a soft recall (unofficial recall).

I disagree that foreign cars are superior in their respective price ranges. I’ve replaced many parts on Honda’s that failed early in the life of the car (master cylinders, radiators, rotors etc…) They rusted at the same rate and the paint failed at the same rate as comparable American cars. Fortunately, Honda parts were no more expensive than matching Ford parts.

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The big 3 aren’t exactly dead. It wasn’t that long ago that the Ford Taurus was the best selling sedan in North America. And what killed them wasn’t quality, but that ‘Ford Oval’ design with oval windows and oval themes all over the car that just flat out didn’t work as a design theme. And they aren’t giving up on sedans - Ford has a new sedan coming out next year, I believe based on the Mazda 6, which is a fine platform.

There’s no question that overall reliability is better among the imports. It’s also the case that imports are generally more expensive than their equivalent domestic competitors, too, so we’re not really comparing apples to apples here.

And Detroit is still kicking Japan’s ass when it comes to trucks. Nissan’s new ‘Titan’ may make some inroads, but by and large the Japanese automakers haven’t really figured out how to compete with Trucks.

I was all set to buy an import vehicle this year, after having a disastrous experience with a Ford Windstar. I wound up buying a Ford Escape. I didn’t want to, it wasn’t part of the plan, but after I looked at all the competitors and crunched the numbers, the Escape won, even after factoring what I felt was a premium for lower reliability. And the Escape is still the best selling small SUV, so they must be doing something right.

I have no loyalty to domestics, but I think by and large they are competitive. My wife’s next car will be a Subaru WRX, because no domestic auto makers make a car with AWD and that kind of performance. So import it is.

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I have always owned American cars. I had a Pontiac Grand Am which left me stranded on the side of the road so often that I knew the tow-truck drivers by their first names and became good friends with the mechanic’s secretary from all the hours I spent chatting with her at the garage. I had a Ford Tempo that had so little pick-up and engine power that I felt like I was driving Buster the Cartoon Car (putt! putt!).

Now I have a Toyota Echo. It’s an entry-level car, but I love it so much that I want to marry it and have its children (which I’m certain would be reliable, attractive, and enthusiastic, the kind of children who get A’s in school and start on the soccer team). I don’t worry about being left on the side of the road. I push the gas, and it goes forward. The gas mileage is astoundingly efficient.

I’ve heard people, every once in a while, say I’m unpatriotic for abandoning American carmakers for a Japanese car. Phooey, I say. There’s nothing more American than good old fashioned capitalism, and I’m not going back to an American car until they can make one that I like the way I like my little Echo.

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Yes if you take all 8 nameplates that reside under the GM brand, then they wipe Toyota out of the water as far as sales of cars go. But that is taken alltogether. Taken individually, every one of GM’s nameplates, (Pontiac, Buick, Chevrolet etc) is lagging behind Toyota in terms of car sales.

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You’d also have to add the Lexus sales to Toyota’s numbers, since the numbers in the article exclude Lexus.

But I wonder - if GM is selling more cars all together than Toyota and Lexus combined, which seems likely, then is this really bad news for GM at all? If car buyers know that e.g. the Chevrolet Astro and the GMC Safari are the same vehicle, then wouldn’t you want to compare sales by manufacturer, not by brand?

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My opinion on the matter is that GM is not just Chevy. I see a ton more gm products out there than I see any japenese product. I don’t understand why they say this stuff for.

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That’s because Toyota only offers two companies. Of course Toyota individually will wipe out the sales of the individual gm brands because there are fewer Toyota brands than GM brands. The 8 or so nameplates of gm give consumers a greater range of products to choose from. GM wipes everyone else out. And another thing, why is the Chevy Impala on the top ten, but not the malibu or the cavalier which I think sell more than the Impala?

I love Toyotas, but GM has them whopped in auto sales.

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I’m driving a NAFTA. (North American Free Trade Agreement)

After the US dropped Atomic bombs on Japan we felt bad. So we bought their cars.

I’ve never worked at a Japanese car plant but I’ve heard the conditions are good. Just think the opposite of America and thats what you get.

What happen to the old pickup? All the trucks I’ve seen are short beds with extended windows no use whatssoever, except maybe going to Mt. Rushmore.

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I’ve seen some huge pickup trucks out there with huge beds, but I don’t think you will find any foreign car companies with them. Maybe a Toyota Tacoma?

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This raises the other question, of course: what, precisely, is a domestic vehicle? Most of the Toyotas and Hondas you see on the road are manufactured here in the U.S. And I believe they have a large proportion of domestic content (i.e., they’re not just shipping parts from Japan and assembling the vehicles here).

You might argue that these outfits are controlled by non-U.S. companies. But so is Chrysler!

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Ditto what Early Out said; I believe Ford has an upcoming SUV that will have engines made in (mainland) China.

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well, the big 3 are dealing with a lot of legacy issues. GM in particular has a huge overhang in terms of retirement, health and other benefits. It’s a hole they dug themselves. Other companies also have older problems coming home to roost. That’s the trouble when you have multibillion dollar development projects and long product lifecycles and horrendous marketing costs.

One way of looking at it is that Toyota made all the right moves in the past 10-20 years. Also Toyota under a very strong yen vis a vis the dollar, had to become very efficient at building cars. Also the whole zero defect thing is turning out to be a cheaper way to build cars in the long run than putting up with a higher failure rate.

Looks like Toyota has made some loyal buyers and that is a tough situation to win back.

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I driving my third Toyota now. All three were new, one after the other. I put 20,000 to 25,000 miles a year on my vehicle, so 4 - 5 years is about max. I have the service done, on time, per factory recommendations. I have never had a warranty claim or spent a day in the service department other than for normal maintenance service, on any of the three cars. In all fairness though, the service department has never been empty when I’ve been there for maintenance. Toyotas aren’t immune to failures. I am probably lucky, or maybe having the cars serviced as recommended makes a big difference. Quality isn’t an American labor vs foreign labor thing either, as the last two Toyotas have been American built, and the quality has remained high. Several friends have had American cars and have had good luck with them too. Gas mileage and other operational costs are not that different either.
The real reason, IMO comes when it is time to trade up. Research the cost of a 4 year old Camry and an equivalent American car. Compare the values you find to the cost of the cars when they were new. That’s a big plus in my book.