Originally posted by Speed_69
I've never owned a Toyota but I've driven quite a few of them (mostly rental cars). They are pretty boring to drive but comfortable and very reliable. ... you've never owned one, yet you can somehow draw the conclusion that Toyotas are reliable from the rental cars you've driven?
By that logic, the Chevrolet Impala, Pontiac Sunfire coupe, Dodge Charger, Dodge Durango, and the Jeep Grand Cherokee I've all rented over the years are of absolutely STELLAR quality because they didn't break down ONCE while I was renting them. :banghead:
Originally posted by Speed_69
One recall isn't going to change my opinion about their vehicles. Many manufacturers have had recalls, it just happens that this one is more major. I'd still consider getting a Toyota after this recall.If THIS recall won't change your opinion about their vehicles, what about the plethora of issues they've been having throughout the decade? Toyota's reputation for quality has been rubbish for years.
An article from the Toronto Star:
Olive: Toyota's reputation for quality long gone
Employees strayed from `Toyota Way' during years of rapid growth
Jan 28, 2010
David Olive
Columnist
My friend Mary Lou in Michigan knows that Toyota's reputation for quality is a sham. On a recent visit, she swept her arm across the width of the dashboard of her year-old Camry, bought new. "Every piece of this trim has fallen off or warped," she said of America's best-selling car.
An analyst at J.D. Power and Associates, the sine qua non in rating vehicle quality, told The Canadian Press Wednesday Toyota's recall of 2.3 million vehicles in the U.S. and 270,000 in Canada "signifies that (Toyota is) not afraid of doing the right thing for the right reasons, that short-term sales and profits are less important than taking care of the consumer and making sure they're safe in Toyota vehicles.''
I'd argue that not one word of that is true.
To start with, Toyota took the extraordinary step this week of suspending production at three U.S. and its two Canadian assembly plants because it was forced to by U.S. law. "It's not a voluntary thing," Toyota spokesman Mike Michels told the Wall Street Journal Wednesday.
More important, Toyota's quality problems go back many years, before the latest recall and last year's massive 4.2-million vehicle recall.
As it embarked on a goal of becoming the world's biggest automaker, Toyota failed to insulate itself from the "big-company disease" that humbled General Motors Co. As Toyota quickly ramped up production of its vehicles, its employees strayed from the automaker's "Toyota Way" of exacting quality control and continuous improvement in manufacturing methods.
It almost had to turn out that way. By 2007 Toyota was adding an average of two new factories a year to its global network, including a second Canadian plant in Woodstock that opened in 2008. Toyota's annual volume growth of about 500,000 vehicles equalled the entire production of Ford Motor Co.'s Volvo brand. By that same year, some 200,000, or two-thirds, of Toyota's workforce was located outside Japan. Toyota could no longer rely on word of mouth to convey the firm's managerial and manufacturing methods.
From 2004 to 2007, Toyota recalled a staggering 9.3 million vehicles – a number exceeding its total annual output, and up from 2.5 million recalls in the three years previous to 2004. In 2005, Toyota's rate of recalls as a percentage of vehicles on the road hit 10.1 per cent, compared with 6.8 per cent from GM and 2.5 per cent at Chrysler Group.
In 2006, Tokyo censured Toyota over improper business practices for failing for eight years to disclose and act on reports of a design flaw implicated in loss-of-control incidents. Loss of control due to accelerator pedals caught under floor mats triggered last year's huge recall, and caused four deaths after a Lexus abruptly went off the road in California.
In the 2007 J.D. Power survey, the Toyota brand scored below that of Hyundai Motor Co., a firm better known for price than quality. And the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety withheld its "top-pick" rating from Toyota's Camry and RAV4 SUV after their substandard performance in whiplash tests.
Also in 2007, Toyota's U.S. division settled a class-action lawsuit brought by motorists claiming that oil-sludge buildup destroyed their engines despite compliance with Toyota's maintenance guidelines.
A long three years ago, then-CEO Katsuaki Watanabe acknowledged to reporters that Toyota's long run of shoddiness was jeopardizing the company. "The world-class quality that we've built is our lifeline."
Yet, despite opening two quality "institutes" in each of North America and Europe to inculcate the "Toyota Way," there has been no meaningful improvement in Toyota quality. Like GM, stuck with too many plants as its market share dropped in half, Toyota has been compelled to keep all its new plants running flat-out to generate the cash flow to finance their construction, even as customer complaints have mounted.
Unlike Honda, Toyota is not an engineering trailblazer. And no one would accuse Toyota of being a trendsetter in styling akin to, say, BMW. Quality is principally what Toyota offers the market.
Toyota realized its goal of eclipsing GM as the world's largest automaker last year. The goal was a dubious one, given the risks. In any case, by late last year, Toyota had been overtaken by Volkswagen.
The only thing saving Toyota is a decades-long reputation for quality that people who still buy its cars don't realize the firm has not lived up to, for more than half a decade.
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