http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/business/3185740 Associated Press GEORGETOWN, Ky. - Toyota Motor Corp. announced plans today to begin producing a gasoline-electric hybrid version of its popular Camry model in late 2006 at its largest North American plant in Georgetown, Ky. The Japanese automaker said it will have capacity to build about 48,000 of the environmentally friendly vehicles each year. It represents Toyota's first hybrid auto production in North America. "Once the decision was reached to make a hybrid version of our best-selling vehicle — the Camry — the Georgetown plant was the natural choice," said Gary Convis, president of the plant. Toyota said it plans a $10 million investment in the Georgetown plant, but said it expects capacity and employment to stay the same. The plant 12 miles north of Lexington employs about 7,000 workers and can build up to 500,000 vehicles per year. Hybrid production will take place on the plant's existing lines, the automaker said. No new construction is planned. The $10 million will go mainly for equipment modifications and employee training. Toyota said specific details about the Camry hybrid will be released later. California and Canada also made a push to land Toyota's first North American hybrid production. Kentucky Gov. Ernie Fletcher, who is on a trade mission to Japan, participated in Toyota's announcement by satellite. "This is truly a great day for Kentucky," Fletcher said. Toyota opened the Georgetown plant in 1987 and it sparked a boom in automotive suppliers in the state. Toyota President Fujio Cho ran the Georgetown plant for its first seven years. The 7.5 million square foot plant produces the Camry, Avalon and Solara models. Toyota's North American headquarters is in Erlanger, which is in the northern Kentucky suburbs of Cincinnati. Hybrid cars get better mileage than regular gasoline powered cars because the hybrid switches back and forth between an electric motor and a gasoline engine. Kentucky lawmakers passed tax legislation earlier this year allowing a manufacturer of hybrid vehicles to recover training and some equipment costs. Besides the planned hybrid Camry, Toyota also produces the hybrid Prius and Lexus RX400h luxury hybrid sport-utility. Next month the Toyota Highlander hybrid midsize SUV goes on sale in the United States.
Last year Toyota was the 2nd best selling autodealer in the US. GM and Ford are reeling from financial losses, so this could be a big deal for Toyota to be number one.
I think he means once they work out the bugs in production, costs go down, efficiencies build up, and they will pass along the cost savings to consumers and crush the inefficient US automakers. Toyota, Nissan & Honda have all moved into the only market left where the US automakers make easy money – trucks. Unless taxpayers bail out the US automakers I think they are all doomed. Within 20 years they will be bankrupt or bought out.
Don't get too excited about Toyota's pickups and SUVs...they just recalled 750,000 today Toyota Recalls 750,000 Pickups, SUVs http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,156852,00.html I would only buy a Ford F-series or a Chevy if I'm going to buy a pickup. Judging by sales figures, the rest of America agrees with me. Ford sells around 750,000 F-series per year. Toyota sells around 150k pickups per year.
I agree...I would probably buy American if I were in the market for a truck. They're cheaper, and the F-series are a solid, reliable(I think) model. However, it's a newer market for Toyota. They had the smaller trucks for years, but I think they introduced the full-size trucks fairly recently to compete with the big boys.
My wife drives a 2002 Prius and it has run beautifully. I'm sure the hybrid Camry's will cost an extra 7k which defeats the purpose of saving gas in my mind.
It seems as if the rest of America is agreeing less with you this year than last year : Toyota Tundra sales up 34% YTD Nissan Titan sales up 49% YTD Ford F-Series sales down 6% YTD Chevy Silverado sales up 3% YTD They're still buying way more Fords and Chevys, but that's to be expected. At the same time, they're gaining more confidence in the foreign makes as well. As far as recalls are concerned, come on - Ford has that market cornered. They may as well just rename the "recall", the "Ford". "My car was forded today!"
Yup. It's just like when foreign cars were introduced. The Escort and Taurus were the kings of sales. People kept buying the Taurus no matter how many recalls, breakdowns, and failures the thing had. For most of its production life the Taurus was junk. But people kept buying it due to brand loyalty and the fact it was less expensive than the competition. I think the truck market will be harder to crack because there's more of a good ol' boy network in areas like construction/fleet sales. Now Honda's jumped into the truck market as well. It may be a while before we see any major competition with the 2 or 3 models that the Japanese makers bring out compared to the F-series which seems to have an endless array of configurations (which also contributes to its popularity).
Of course the fact that US carmakers have much higher legacy costs per vehicle impacts how much they spend on engineering, R&D ,etc, so it really is a slippery slope from them. I'm pretty sure, with the contracts they have in place and the benefits to their retirees, both will be bankrupt. Best case scenario is that they basically just end up pumping all profits into the pensions, etc so that only their shareholders get screwed instead of them declaring bankruptcy, shifting pension to govt, cancelling all medical benefits to retirees. Of course that assumes they don't have lots of layoffs to stave off the bankruptcy. Reminds me a lot of the steel companies...where basically everyone was working for the retirees b/c of the obligations..until they all went bankrupt
