By on August 1, 2008

That ship has sailed. (courtesy z.about.com)The July sales numbers are starting to come in and they're not encouraging. Toyota's overall sales dropped 11.9 percent from last July.  As you can probably guess, trucks were responsible for the largest chunk of Toyota's dismal numbers; passenger cars were down only 5.7 percent while trucks plummeted 29.5 percent. If Toyota's turning in numbers like this, it's going to be scary to see everyone else's reports. We'll post 'em as we get 'em.

Click here for Toyota sales press release

[NB: The numbers in the official press release are adjusted for sales days; TTAC reports the unadjusted numbers.]

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36 Comments on “Toyota Drops 11.9%...”


  • avatar
    toxicroach

    Fords numbers are out, and actually they did better than Toyota.

  • avatar
    psarhjinian

    Even the almighty Prius was off by 15 percent.

    Yes, but isn’t that a supply issue?

  • avatar
    Scottie

    Toyota is only down 12% in the US, which isn’t quite as bad as Ford. And Toyota’s problem is they can’t keep up with small car Production. Ford has a small car.

    http://freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080801/BUSINESS01/80801037

  • avatar
    Juniper

    And the F- Series is back in the lead! Yee Ha!(at least for this month)
    Scottie
    Double check your numbers.

  • avatar
    AuricTech

    Suzuki’s June 2008 numbers don’t look hideous; they’re down 5% compared to June 2007, with YTD for 2008 down 2% compared to the same time last year:

    American Suzuki press release (PDF format)

  • avatar
    KatiePuckrik

    It had to be expected! In an economy where Toyota are posting losses, it only makes Ford, GM and Chrysler’s turnarounds that much more urgent and more difficult.

    I know Toyota said they’d halt SUV and truck manufacture and increase 4 cylinder/hybrid production, but,when will Toyota start to see they benefit of this? A few weeks? A few months? A few months?

    Or is it some meaningless spin….?

  • avatar
    CarShark

    @Juniper:

    I think Scottie’s talking in unadjusted numbers, which is what TTAC uses.

  • avatar

    Toyota actually did better than Ford. Ford reported -14.9% unadjusted, but Toyota gave adjusted numbers. Toyota was actually down 11.9% unadjusted.

    Frank, I thought TTAC’s policy was to report unadjusted numbers? Whichever you go with – adjusted or unadjusted – you guys should be consistent to avoid confusion like some of the comments above indicated.

    The Ford press release cracked me up, with the line about how the Focus continues to surprise auto industry watchers – yep, because none of us expected a questionably-styled vehicle with an ugly interior, built on a rehashed nearly 10 year old platform to do well. Silly us!

  • avatar
    Busbodger

    So the TTAC post that said gas was down to $3.64 in Oklahoma yesterday doesn’t brighten up the future for these gas-addicted auto makers?

    I figure about 15 mins after gas gets below $3.50 a gallon folks will forget all about $4 gas again.

  • avatar
    alex_rashev

    Is it just me or Toyota’s increasingly GM’ish attitude towards cost-cutting is coming back to bite them in the ass?

    I’m surprised that they aren’t getting totally slaughtered in the compact segment. Heck, Hyundai is making a better Corolla than Toyota, and it’s cheaper, too. Then there’s the squeeze from a fairly decent Civic, Mazda3 is taking over the sporty market (steamroller style), and the two domestics have improved their products and firmly took over the bottom of the barrel. What does Toyota do? Hand us a craptastic 09 and hope that it’ll eat up the void left by Neon and Sentra (now that one is not there and the other one is utter crap).

    I must say, though, pissing away 30 years of hard-earned reputation takes quite a bit of time and effort.

  • avatar

    ChrisHaak:
    Frank, I thought TTAC’s policy was to report unadjusted numbers? Whichever you go with – adjusted or unadjusted – you guys should be consistent to avoid confusion like some of the comments above indicated.

    We do, whenever we have the unadjusted numbers. However, the first numbers we get are in the press releases and the manufactures just love those adjusted numbers! We’ll report the unadjusted ones whenever we can get a breakdown that goes beyond just aggregated numbers at the manufacturer level.

  • avatar
    ScottGSO

    The Lexus #’s are probably really concerning to Toyota. They lease a good deal of their cars and trucks (I’d wager above 50%, anyone know?) and their residuals are probably getting creamed along with everyone else’s. Sure they can weather it better than the big 3, but you’d have to thing even Toyota is singing the blues and will take lease writedowns soon.

  • avatar
    thoots

    Some perspective, perhaps?

    alex_rashev :

    I’m surprised that they aren’t getting totally slaughtered in the compact segment…..

    …..What does Toyota do?

    Ummm, “Sell more cars in the segment than any of the others?”

    Yes, sure, it’s a horserace between Corolla and Civic in any given month, but everything else is just dust under Corolla’s and Civic’s tires.

    So, “must be you.” Some third of a million people per year seem to disagree with you.

  • avatar
    RobertSD

    Both companies have the same problem. They both have a small car, but neither has any inventory of that small car. Days supply of the both the Corolla and Focus is about 30 days last I checked. The only model where Toyota can claim massive product shortage where other makes cannot is the Prius. I’m sorry, but a 12% drop at Toyota is not all inventory related. Just as a 13% drop at FLM (15% with Volvo, which took a BEATING this month!) is not all about the wrong product.

  • avatar
    Stingray

    @KatiePuckrik

    Changing production takes some months… more than 6 at best… Depends also on what was being assembled before in that line. The you have pre-production, ramp-up and mass production stages. Of course the time each one takes depends also on managers ass kicking to employees and workers ;)

    alex_rashev :
    Is it just me or Toyota’s increasingly GM’ish attitude towards cost-cutting is coming back to bite them in the ass?

    If you see a Land Cruiser Prado or a 1st generation Yaris interior… you will see the very definition of craptastic. They have recalled SUVs here… again.

  • avatar

    There is at least one bright spot:

    http://www.usatoday.com/money/autos/2008-07-31-prius_N.htm

    “Driven by gas prices and waiting lists for new Priuses at many dealers, buyers paid an average $27,945 in June for a 2008 Prius with an average 8,000 miles on it — about $1,300 above the average transaction price for a new one, Power Information Network found.

    Even 2007 models that had logged an average 22,000 miles sold for only $276 less than dealers were getting for a Prius direct from the factory.“

  • avatar
    carsinamerica

    I’m surprised that they aren’t getting totally slaughtered in the compact segment. Heck, Hyundai is making a better Corolla than Toyota, and it’s cheaper, too. Then there’s the squeeze from a fairly decent Civic, Mazda3 is taking over the sporty market (steamroller style), and the two domestics have improved their products and firmly took over the bottom of the barrel. What does Toyota do? Hand us a craptastic 09 and hope that it’ll eat up the void left by Neon and Sentra (now that one is not there and the other one is utter crap).

    I don’t what Hyundai you’re talking about. If it’s the Elantra, blah. I just bought my first new car a few months back, and I drove a Civic, Corolla, Elantra, Sentra, and Mazda3 all in a row (I skipped the Lancer b/c an acquaintance of mine owns one and said it was poor).

    The Mazda3 is sporty, true, but it pays for it: the funky cockpit effect makes it hard to read the gauges, and the ride was bone-jarring on the local roads I used for test-driving. Since that’s what I drive every day, pretty clear it was a bad choice.

    As for Hyundai’s “better Corolla”, I was deeply unimpressed. I wanted a manual transmission, and the Elantra’s was appalling, with a vague clutch and a notchy, grindy shifter. The interior was grey, grey, and grey. And dull. The engine was noisy and unrefined. It’s spacious, to be sure, but it’s as grim as a monk’s cell. More importantly, it’s bare-bones on features. If you want traction and stability control (and I did), you had to buy the SE, and since the stick shift was nightmarishly bad (I told the salesman as soon as we got back, “I would have to buy this car in an automatic, because the manual is awful.”), now you’re talking about a price within $1,000 of a Corolla S optioned out the way I wanted it, and the Corolla would still have more feaures.

    In the end, I went with the Corolla, although I liked a lot about the Civic, too. I’ve owned Toyotas before, and they’ve always been reliable and sturdy, and that helped me decide, but the bottom line is that I cross-shopped the competition, and knew all the facts and figures before I test-drove them, and the Toyota still won. Sounds like they’re doing something right.

  • avatar
    davey49

    I’m surprised the Scion xD doesn’t do better

  • avatar
    Geotpf

    ScottGSO :
    August 1st, 2008 at 3:03 pm

    The Lexus #’s are probably really concerning to Toyota.

    Nope. Lexus’s numbers are extremely streaky. That is, sales shoot up (usually by several hundred percent) whenever a model is refreshed, and then fall back down to earth in six months to a year afterwards. Lexus’s only new model at the moment is the LX, which is a large SUV, a market segment that is being slaughtered-but the LX’s sales are up 277.7% in July (adjusted; the number would be even higher unadjusted).

    That is, just like an air conditioner manufacturer’s sales are lousy in December, Lexus’s sales are lousy when they don’t have any new models. Toyota expects this and has budgeted and planned for it.

    The Prius has a supply issue. The Corolla, Camry, and Yaris were all up, although only the Corolla was up using adjusted numbers. Their pickups, SUVs, and vans were all down like everybody else’s (except for their new models, the Lexus LX, Toyota Land Cruiser, and Toyota Sequoia-which all happen to be friggin’ huge gas guzzlers).

    That is, Toyota’s numbers look a lot worse than they really are. The decrease is due to supply problems with the Prius, Lexus being between refreshes of most of it’s product, and the general weakness in the non-car segment. Using adjusted numbers also makes everything look worse this month, since there were two fewer “selling days” this year.

  • avatar
    CSJohnston

    So let me get this straight o supply-issue apologists.

    Toyota sold 18.7% fewer vehicles in the US last month because they didn’t have anything to sell?

    Too simple. Face facts. Toyota’s got just as many pigs that need lipstick on the lot as the domestics (as they compete head-to-head in almost every segment).

    Toyota can make boneheaded mistakes with the best of them. If they were freakin’ geniuses for the foresightful billions they spent on the Prius they are freakin’ retards for the Tundra, a project that also cost Toyota billions.

  • avatar

    CSJohnston :

    Well, yes and no.

    No question: Toyota got hammered for having a truck heavy lineup.

    Also no question: the Tundra is not a mistake– long term. When one or all of the Big 2.8 go C11, Toyota will make plenty of hay.

  • avatar
    CSJohnston

    Robert,

    I agree that the Tundra was not a mistake just a victim of lousy timing.

    If there is a long-term issue with the Tundra it is that it was always conceived as a uniquely American vehicle that did not have a lot of global potential. Toyota NA pushed head office for the truck pretty hard.

    Toyota tends to think globally with respect to its product planning and platforms. The Tundra was in many ways as experimental to Toyota as the Prius. Will Toyota corporate culture give the truck time given that global mindset or will its long-term approach win out?

    And anyway the “can do no wrong” line of thought throughout the post brought forth the rant.

  • avatar

    CSJohnston :

    Agreed. Those who think Toyota can walk on water are sadly, badly mistaken. While I’ll spot Toyota the Tundra, the introduction of the Scion brand, and the bloating of the xB, are a major miscalculation worthy (unworthy?) of GM.

  • avatar
    toxicroach

    End of the day, the Toyota is still making money. And it is able to adapt to demand faster than GM, because it has a healthy line up of cars that people still want. They can ramp up production of its hot models, rather than waiting 3 years to develop or import the necessary car builds.

    It’s no surprise that the major car companies are having shrinking sales. But it isn’t a volume race, its a profit race. And Toyota is looking to bank about 22 billion US (globally) this year despite everything. That’s what happens when you have a solid foundation; even bad times don’t hurt you too bad.

    Not to mention that Toyota isn’t practically begging for sales through wild incentives. Toyota is offering 2.9% financing and 750 cash back on the Highlander. If Toyota was offering GM level incentives, their entire product line would be flying off the lot.

    Comparing the woes of GM & Toyota is just not even remotely in the same league. Sorry.

  • avatar

    @CSJohnston :
    August 1st, 2008 at 9:49 pm

    Robert,

    I agree that the Tundra was not a mistake just a victim of lousy timing.

    ===

    Showing up for battle too late with the wrong weapon is a mistake. :-)

    Toyota may be taking the long view here, though, figuring that some of the regular truck manufacturers will go belly up, and that the segment will still have legitimate demand. With Toyota still around, they will be able to meet the demand.

    But it’s clear, from their downscaling of capacity in the segment, that they couldn’t resist going along with the “everyone wants a truck” mantra, and that it’s biting them now.

    ===

    And yes – Toyota and GM can’t be compared. While Toyota is making less icecream, GM finds itself without cows.

  • avatar
    Matt51

    Other companies are starting to take sales from Toyota. Suzuki is going to introduce new, very improved cars. Hyundai-Kia, Daewoo, will keep improving and taking more sales. Honda, Mazda, Nissan are not going to give up, and have more interesting cars.
    Toyota in some ways is becoming like GM. Bland boring cars – starting with the Corolla. I would prefer a Civic, Suzuki SX or Forenza or Reno, Nissan Versa or Sentra, Mazda 3, Ford Focus, Elantra,Impreza, Lancer. Yaris is not impressive in any way. Just boring.
    I have a base Tacoma, it has the absolute worst seat of any vehicle I ever owned – GMC Sierra base truck seat was much more comfortable. The ride of the Tacoma does not match GM or Nissan small trucks. Otherwise, it is nice, but not outstanding in anyway. Suzuki usually gets seats right. Not Toyota.
    So many good choices, Toyota decided to be safe and conservative and sell bland cars. There just are more interesting choices available. Even GM with the Malibu has caught the Camry. Tundra was a financial mistake of massive proportions. Just as GM started thrashing around not knowing what they were doing, now Toyota is thrashing around. More nimble competitors, including new ones from India and China, will keep hitting Toyota. It won’t get any easier.
    Toyota is following the path of GM. Lack of focus, lack of excitement in their products, product misses(Tundra).

  • avatar
    tulsa_97sr5

    Watching Toyota and their attempts with the truck market over the years the Tundra seems to me to be them finally giving up and making what people insisted they NEEDED. The T100, and previous versions of the tundra seemed like Toyota saying, here, really this is all you need in a work truck, with their sales telling Toyota otherwise. I think it’s a cultural thing, and the results can be seen in the current accord/camry as well.

    I’m a little confused by Toyota’s response to the current market. The only thing I can figure out is that they, along with Honda have decided to just ride it out and take their lumps. If anyone could afford the extreme incentives we’re seeing it’s Toyota, but for the most part they are holding steady. Looking at the incentive numbers on Edmunds they are a little higher than last year, but still around half what the domestics offer per car, and last I saw still less than honda. Don’t they know the most important thing is this quarters numbers???

    Last thought in my very disjointed post, I remember a quote from my business school days to the effect of “strong/good businesses spend money to expand during the bad times so they are ready to take full advantage when it turns around”

  • avatar
    Johnson

    alex_rashev:
    Is it just me or Toyota’s increasingly GM’ish attitude towards cost-cutting is coming back to bite them in the ass?

    I’m surprised that they aren’t getting totally slaughtered in the compact segment. Heck, Hyundai is making a better Corolla than Toyota, and it’s cheaper, too. Then there’s the squeeze from a fairly decent Civic, Mazda3 is taking over the sporty market (steamroller style), and the two domestics have improved their products and firmly took over the bottom of the barrel. What does Toyota do? Hand us a craptastic 09 and hope that it’ll eat up the void left by Neon and Sentra (now that one is not there and the other one is utter crap).

    I must say, though, pissing away 30 years of hard-earned reputation takes quite a bit of time and effort.

    Yes, it’s just you. I must say, you are really trying hard to make Toyota look as bad as GM, and you’re failing miserably at it so far.

    I’m surprised you’re even making some of the statements that you are.

    Hyundai is making a “better Corolla”? You’re kidding, right? Are you talking about the Elantra? The Corolla has a better quality/reliability reputation, it has better fuel economy (best-in-class fuel economy in fact), and it’s more comfortable and more refined than the Elantra. Exactly how is Hyundai making a “better Corolla” here? Fact is they’re not.

    The facts, and the market are completely against you. The Corolla *once again* out-sold the Civic for July, just like it did in June. Civic sales topping Corolla sales in May was simply an anomaly. It would be awfully ignorant to dismiss the Corolla and it’s best-in-class fuel economy along with it’s reputation in this current market, where people are worried about fuel prices.

    And Mazda 3 is “taking over” the sporty market? Just like the Mazda 6 is supposedly “taking over” the sporty sedan market? Oh wait, Mazda 6 sales are almost non-existent compared to Accord and Camry sales. What exactly is the “sporty market” anyway? How do you define and quantify that? Simply cars that in your *opinion* fit some sort of definition of “sporty”? Mazda 3 sales are still struggling to beat Focus and Cobalt sales. The market has spoken … and the Mazda 3 as well as the Mazda 6 are NOT that well-liked, nowhere near as well-liked by the market as many enthusiasts naively believe. Mazda 3 competes in the compact class, and the Mazda 6 competes in the midsize sedan class. Both models are getting eaten alive sales-wise compared to the competition from Honda and Toyota, even the competition from Ford and GM. To top it all off, Toyota has lower incentives than Mazda and Honda, but you knew that already right?

    Matt51:
    Toyota is following the path of GM. Lack of focus, lack of excitement in their products, product misses(Tundra).

    You’re following the path of media hype, and internet bandwagons.

    There is absolutely nothing factual to suggest Toyota is following the “path” of GM.

    Show some proof that Toyota has a lack of focus, otherwise stop making such silly remarks.

  • avatar
    Pch101

    Toyota has become such a prominent car seller in the US that it’s just a barometer for the economy as a whole.

    Unemployment is rising, credit is tight, consumers are worried, so they just aren’t spending as they used to. Most companies are not doing as well as they used to. That’s to be expected, and Toyota is no exception.

    The Big 2.8 have it much worse because on top of their ongoing problems, they have very few vehicles that can appeal to the car market that remains. Honda has it a bit better than Toyota because they never had the profits from the SUV and luxury car markets to lose, but they face the same economic issues that everyone else does.

    The sales situation is going to get worse for everyone before it gets better. The difference is that Toyota, Honda and BMW will survive it for sure; Detroit just might not make it.

  • avatar
    Geotpf

    Ok, lets break it down further, using raw numbers (IE, unadjusted).

    Lexus is down due to being between refreshes for everything other than the low-selling LX (whose sales are more than quadruple what they were last July).

    The Yaris is up.
    The Corolla is up.
    The Camry is up.

    The Avalon is down (needs a refresh, and has been a bit of a sales dog for quite awhile, frankly).

    The Prius is down, due to supply problems. The supply problems only affect really the Prius (and Camry Hybrid), although there may be spot shortages of certain trims or feature packages in some areas of the Yaris/Corolla/Camry. These spot shortages in small to midsized cars are not exclusive to Toyota; there are reports of shortages of Focuses, for example.
    Scion is treading water at best. Year to year comparisons are hard since there was no 2007 model year Scion xA/xD or xB. The tC needs an update badly.

    Net result, for cars, is that Toyota brand plus Scion was up by 2,737 cars. Factoring in Lexus’s old line up, and they were down 809 cars. This is treading water, which is the best one can hope for in this economy.

    Now, they got slaughtered in vans/SUVs/pickups, just like everybody else. Fortuantly for Toyota, they sell more cars than “light trucks”-almost twice as many (now). The Detroit 3 all still sell many more “light trucks” than cars.

  • avatar
    davey49

    The Mazda 3 is the best selling car that Mazda has ever sold so it does deserve some credit. Mazda has never been a high volume seller in the US.

  • avatar
    Matt51

    Hi Johnson, I stand by what I wrote.

    Lack of focus = large pickups just before big pickup market tanks. Honda had a better approach. Large trucks are a peculiar market Toyota does not need to be in.

    Unexciting boring cars. GM was very big and successful a while back, and look what happened. I rented a Corolla and was underwhelmed. I own a Tacoma. Go drive a Canyon or Frontier, then drive a Tacoma. Which has a better ride? Yaris? get real. Toyota was first with Honda on hybrids, they do get credit for this.

    There are many competitors, and they are offering more interesting cars. Where is the Camry rated relative to Accord?

    In nearly every category, Toyota is selling based on its name. Show me the reviews against leading competitors which say Toyota is best in class. Yaris? Corolla? Camry? in the heart of the market they are not at the top.

    What Edmunds.com says

    “As expected, the 2009 Toyota Camry is pleasant to drive and spacious enough to keep a family of four content on a long road trip. But newer competition has managed to better this segment titan in overall performance and cabin refinement.”

    “Likable as it is, the 2009 Toyota Camry has some significant caveats. One is that its historically excellent build and materials quality has slipped in the last few years, and reliability has slipped. Competitors who have trailed the Camry in the past have stepped up their game, surpassing the Toyota in many areas. One in particular is handling — in spite of its quickness and speed, the Camry is not an athlete, placing light-effort driving over communicative steering that would lend a sense of confidence to the driver. For those who prefer greater feedback and a more involving driving experience, the Chevrolet Malibu, Honda Accord, Mazda 6 and Nissan Altima are worthy of close consideration.

    “And then there is pricing — the ever-popular Camry commands a premium over value-packed rivals such as the Malibu, Ford Fusion and Hyundai Sonata. Of course, there is the Camry’s chief competitor, the Honda Accord, which provides a more involving drive, though not as hushed a freeway ride as the Toyota. It also beats the Camry in terms of cabin materials and build quality.

    TTAC may have better reviews, I just grabbed Edmunds because it seemed representative.

  • avatar
    alex_rashev

    Lots of folks seem to be offended by my remark on the fact that Hyundai was a better Corolla than a Corolla itself. Well, I must say: the cream’n’black interior was the best interior I’ve seen in a (new) compact car thus far. Haven’t tried the stick, but the slushbox was just as craptastic as Corolla’s (or a 1976 TH350; my Caprice’s 4-speed seems to be a better autobox than what’s offered in most compacts these days). And it was exactly like a 90’s Corolla – roomy, nice, reasonably powerful (note, Corolla was rarely a fuel economy champion) and reliable. Speaking of reliability, what worries me about Toyota is the attitude with which they approached their recent problems (like the infamous Camry sludge). Very GM-like.

    Regardless, Toyota is getting seriously cheap on their cars, and it shows. Camry is a great example – it’s incredibly cheap compared to the previous two designs. My father owns a 2000 model and it’s head and shoulders above the current behemoth in terms of interior quality and refinement.

    As of Toyota’s lack of focus, I’d have to agree – it’s rather apparent. They now (since Rav4 redesign) have three roughly similar mid-size SUV’s – Rav4, Highlander, and 4runner, all busy eating at each other; and that’s not even counting FJ Crusier. Avalon is in a worse shape than its arch-enemy Maxima, now that Camry got Buickized. Furthermore, Toyota killed off Celica and MR2 without properly replacing them on the Scion side. Scion itself is hardly a success, since it now serves to the exact opposite of its target demographic – for every xC-touting kid out there, there’s a couple past-the-Buick-age customers for the rest of the lineup. Finally, failure to meet the demand – Pontiac Solstice anyone? I see more and more of GM as time goes by. Number One curse?

  • avatar
    KixStart

    alex_rashev,

    There’s a thing we do called “looking stuff up.” It’s amazing the things one learns. The car you characterize as a “behemoth,” for example, is a couple inches shorter and 150lbs lighter than a New Malibu, with a much tighter turning radius. Is the New Malibu a behemoth? Let us know.

    The “roughly similar mid-size SUVs”… the smaller two unibody vehicles differ by 600 lbs and at least a few inches in each dimension and by quite a bit more in GVW and trailering power. The other is built on a truck chassis, has a much larger displacement engine and clearly has a different appeal.

    Does Toyota need all 3? Maybe not but they ARE very different vehicles competing for different slots in the market.

  • avatar
    alex_rashev

    KixStart,

    – The three SUV’s are, in an average buyers’ eyes, the same. 4Runner and Highlander are about the same size, are within 200lbs in weight difference, and both are equally good(bad) as a minivan on stilts, since that’s what 95% of the customers actually need anyway. Rav4, while still lighter, is rapidly approaching the two in size – it gained 700+ pounds since last refresh, and now has an optional V6, making it a cross-shopping alternative to the Highlander.

    – Regarding Camry being a porker – Weight does not a porker make. For example, a 2800lb 1993 Buick Skylark is a pig; at the same time, most Mercedes roadsters are damn nimble for a two-ton brick of steel. Having driven countless Buicks and Oldsmobiles, as well as both 00′ and 06′ Camry’s, I can safely say that the new Camry is much closer to the not-so nimble american steel than to its more civilized predecessor.

    As far as the look-up-the-numbers piss fight, I’m not quite sure that it’s fair to pick an all-auto Malibu and compare it to a bare-bones manual Camry CE for weight (for I don’t see how else you could come up with the number). Try Ford Fusion – over 150 lbs lighter bone-to-bone, same interior volume, and roughly the same everything else. Heck, V6 for V6, a Camry weighs just as much as Buick Lucerne. Does it make them equivalent? Doubt it.

    Regardless, I’ve actually driven the Camry and it’s a pig to drive. IMO, “Looking stuff up” is an equivalent to wanking when it comes to evaluating cars. Nothing like the real thing.

  • avatar
    KixStart

    alex_rashev,

    I like measurements. They take away the subjective element. If you want subjective, I’ve driven the Camry (most recently because I dropped of a car for routine service that would take a while and the dealer lent me one) and I find it to be a fine automobile that feels balanced, not heavy. The interior is not a leather Accord but it’s also not bad at all. It’s not a Formula 1 car but, among other things, the way I drive, I always end up taking advantage of a tight turning radius and cars with large ones (*cough*malibu*cough*) always feel to me as though they are bigger than they really are.

    The weight I picked, by the way, was published on Edmunds for the auto Camry LE and a similarly priced auto Malibu.

    As for the twinning of the Toyota SUVs… I expect that anyone who has bought any one of those could give you perfectly good reasons why he went for door #1, rather than doors #2 or #3. The Rav4 is much smaller than the Highlander and will get significantly better fuel economy at a cost of capacity and tow capability. The unibody Highlander driving experience is much different than the 4Runner driving experience. The availability of different engines in the Rav4 is not a liability and it doesn’t make it a Highlander clone, the V6 gives it a level of performance you won’t get with a Highlander.

    By way of comparison, explain the difference in appeal between the Outlook, Acadia and Enclave? And their brother-to-be, the Traverse? Now, there’s 4 SUVs where one would do.

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