Once upon a time I loved Toyota. Though I’ve flirted with other brands — Fiat (something I still can’t explain) and BMW (now driven by the ex) — I’ve always regarded Toyota as the most rational choice when it came to choosing wheels. Solid, reliable. A little more exciting than it used to be, but that’s not the reason you buy one: you buy it because it’s a Toyota.
So why am I driving a new Hyundai?
It took me months to decide on a car. Long story short, after weighing up all my options, taking advice from everyone from David Bullard to my Facebook friends (the technical term is crowdsourcing), assessing factors such as reputation, after sales service, specs and performance, I went for a Hyundai i20 1.6. In terms of value for money, no other car in its class could compete.
I would have considered a Yaris if it came with a 1.6 engine. I’ve driven the Auris and the RAV4 and hated them both. Toyota just didn’t have what I was looking for, certainly not in my price range. So my reasons for choosing a brand other than Toyota may have nothing to do with its record of reliability in South Africa. But I can’t help but read my desertion of the brand in the context of the problems the manufacturer is experiencing globally.
I just don’t trust Toyota the way I used to, and I’m not the only one. US Toyota resale values have declined. The share price is tanking and, inevitably, the jokes have started. You can click here for a collection of 80 Toyota jokes and counting, but some of the more popular ones include “Just driving my new Toyota. Chat later, can’t stop” and “Toyota is telling its customers for safety reasons they should stop driving their cars. Owners said ‘We’re trying!’ ”
(Perhaps Toyota should take over Standard Bank’s payoff line: Moving forward — which, in an ironic twist, has been the brand’s payoff line in the US since 2004.)
Yep, Toyota is in the dwang, and now that over 52 000 vehicles are being recalled in South Africa — and that it has been revealed that Toyota knew about steering problems in the Auris but kept quiet — what was an interesting global story now has local significance.
Toyota was the poster child for efficient manufacturing processes that seemed to manage the impossible, marrying low cost with good quality. Now, it seems that quality and reliability was sacrificed on the altar of growth.
The case studies will never again focus on how Toyota conquered the world, not convincingly anyway. Instead, they’ll focus on how Toyota conquered the world — and then lost it.
So, will this mess end up being the story of how to kill a great brand?
I don’t think a brand as powerful as Toyota will experience dramatic declines in sales. Ford was at the sharp end of publicity during the early noughties thanks to its problems with the Explorer, but that doesn’t appear to influence whether motorists choose to buy a Ford now.
But however this current crisis is resolved, Toyota will never be the same. Its name, previously beyond reproach, has been irrevocably tarnished. Read the following statement taken from a press release by Toyota’s ad agency, Draftfcb, explaining why they came up with Buddy the talking dog:
“Buddy was developed to remind consumers that Toyota vehicles are ‘loyal’ and will never let their owners down, trust being the one quality Toyota truly owns, the one characteristic its competitors can’t challenge it on.”
Did you pull a face? Chuckle at the irony of how trust is the one characteristic that Toyota has now lost? I did.
If a Toyota loyalist like me can be persuaded to switch to Hyundai, others can too. In a new twist on an old jingle: Everything keeps going wrong, Toyota.
If it ends up pushing down the price of the FT-86, I’m a happy hoon.
Hi Sarah
I think you are a little mischevious in writing off Toyota in favour of the Korean Hyundai jalopy.
Most honest writers would still give Toyo
ota the edge in design, reliability and resale, despite the recalls.
Where Hyundai scores is with its 5year/100000km warranty and a perception of better value in terms of bang for the buck.
You wouldn’t have nailed the Hyundai ad account by any chance?
Dear, sweet Sarah. I have a Toyota. It has served long and true. A problem is only a problem if it’s not fixed. Toyota are fixing the problem, so it ceases to be a problem. My faith in the brand remains. Great cars.
I just bought a Toyota keyboarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
I predict you would be buying a CHERY in 5years time…..?
I still wouldn’t buy a Hyundai for any reason, good or otherwise.
Say hi to Hyundai — the seoulful beast from the east.
It’s the new black.
My first new car was a 1986 Corolla 1.3GL. A really nice car.
Last year my car was written-off and I had a rental Yaris for nearly a month. It was amazing what you could get in to it, and how well the seats folded away.
The problem was that each time you used the clutch to pull away it would engage at a different point. If you were expecting it to engage at the top of its stroke, and this time it took lower down, you would come close to stalling it. If you gave it a few more revs because you thought it would engage lower down the stroke, and it took higher up, by the time it engaged, the revs would be quite high and everyone would look around to see who the “boy racer” was.
A really nice car, if you didn’t have to drive it.
I am no car expert but it seems all modern car models are not made to last more than a few years. While here in the Eastern Cape we still see 20 + year old Toyota bakkies driving around, somehow I don’t think we will be seeing any of the current models 20 years into the future. Maybe Toyota just moved with the times and started making disposable cars like everybody else.
Sarah
The best Toyota joke I have seen so far was a cartoon.
It showed a hearse with a coffin in it, viewed from behind, and on the back window is a sticker “My other car is a Toyota”
Short answer – No!
personally i’ve always preferred Nissans and/or Volksies… still drive a ’78 beetle [mainly around the neighbourhood... roadblocks are an issue] Feel much about Audi’s the way you now feel about toyotas, which i never liked. So much so, i wont spell the name with a capital
Hyundai’s reliablty rating is currently very good. The Koreans are trying extremely hard to beat the Japanese at every aspect of engineering. And, in some areas they are winning.
It took a Korean company (Hyundai) to produce the first relatively affordable Asian rear-wheel drive grand tourer coupé since the 80s (the Genesis Coupv), a move which compelled Toyota, long the most boring car company around, to revive their much loved Hachiroku in the form of the aforementioned FT-86.
You can’t be complacent when you’re in second place. Toyota–and I say this despite how much I loved my ultra-dependable old KE-70–had become thoroughly complacent, boring, uninspired and passionless. The recall is proof of it.
German cars are overpriced,overengineered and
overrated.When you have a problem its a big expensive problem.
Compare the build quality between your Hyundai and the two you passed up – Toyota Auris/Yaris. Far better on the T-brand!!
Beware – yer gets wot yer pays fer…always!!
Engineers face delicate choices between: weight saving and strength, to name but one.
Of the hundreds of moving parts in any vehicle, if only one shows signs of early wear, you are very fortunate.
Does Honda market in SA?
Most people I know regard it as even better than Toyota for the same cost. I’ve had three Japanese cars–my first car at 16, a used 1986 Nissan Sentra; when I graduated college, an Acura Integra (Honda’s upper end), and a few years later, a Toyota Corolla. Great cars all.
Hyundai still feels like their not-as-clever little brother.
When VW gave away its greatest brand power: reliability and longevity, Toyota took it over.
A dealer manager told me a few years ago that the new Toyota models would not be built to last; he was right. Toyota is giving away its greatest brand power…
Another manufacturer is sure to take it over and may have the savvy to make a greener model.
Cars are like ad agencies. Once you’ve reached the top, there’s only one way you can go and always dozens of others clawing their way over you to take your place.
I briefly owned a Toyota Corolla about five years ago, before a nasty accident. I enjoyed driving it, but the build quality was just not good and the hooter was pathetic. It sounded like a toy car.
Afterwards I bought a Renault Scenic. I won’t buy Renault again for various reasons, but compared to the Toyota Verso it was far superior in build quality, space, essential features like airbags all round and price.
I’ve never heard the hooter on a Toyota Verso, but will bet good money that it can’t match the Scenic there either!
Do not write off anything Japanese as yet, Toyota included. The Japanese have three distinctive capabilities that come in handy in the face of setbacks. These are:- 1) resilience, 2) ability to bounce back and 3) self reliance. The first two, according to Peter Schwartz, in his book, The Art of the Long View, were built up over the years, partly because, the Japanese had to constantly live with the “four devils,”namely, earthquakes, fires, hurricanes and unwise leaders. With regards to self reliance, Schwartz argues that, ‘people in Japan save money not because they want to take over the world, but because they know they might have to rebuild after disasters.” My sense is that this applies equally to Toyota. I suspect that Toyota has built up a strong brand balance sheet from years of strong and predictable brand earnings that they can now draw on to offset their current brand liabilities at least for now.
Your choice of Fiat isn’t totally inexplicable. Often long on styling and short on quality, Fiats are like a sexy but high-maintenance boyfriend/girlfriend. You know the car isn’t a wise choice, you know you will rue the decision later, but you just can’t help yourself in the moment.
(Not all Fiats are sleek and sexy. If your Fiat was an ugly one, it was probably the value-oriented part of your brain that made you buy it. “Yes, it’s junk, but look at the price!”)
-Roger
Toyota executives are currently testifying before Congress about the safety issues that have led to the recall of millions of vehicles. They insist that “We are confident that no problems exist with the electronic throttle control system in our vehicles.”