The honeymoon is over
I grew up working on Toyotas. When they were mechanically simple vehicles they were amazing. Toyota mastered engineering simple mechanical systems. Their electrical control systems were also very good. They almost always found the best and simplest solution to any engineering challenge. They were never afraid to eat legacy engineering costs and make incremental changes to improve their products. Where GM would continue using two different sized alternator bolts because they didn't want to redesign an alternator bracket, Toyota would redesign their water pump after only two years in production to ensure a better function.
Those days are over. Toyota, in its desire to become the world's largest automaker, has made many missteps as of late. Toyota has earned a reputation for quality and reliability. No automaker always makes 100% perfect products all the time. Toyota has been close enough to that for long enough that they were beyond reproach. They entered the American market with small cars that were well-made and didn't feel cheap or junky. They moved upscale with their initial buyers so that as people who bought Corollas in the early 80s aged Toyota had larger and nicer cars available for them to buy.
Now the veil is being lifted on Toyota. It turns out that they're not perfect, they're just good at hiding and/or ignoring problems. http://money.cnn.com/2010/02/04/autos/prius_timeline/ From the aforementioned article: "Toyota has known about brake problems in its popular Prius cars for some time, going so far as to fix it in new production vehicles, but has kept Prius drivers in the dark about the problem until the Japanese government called for an investigation." What? Saintly Toyota did not think they needed to notify owners of problems with their brakes? The standard line to excuse any Toyota recall is always "But they're Toyota; they are always honest and try and take care of their customers. That's why people trust them." People only trusted Toyota because they didn't know what Toyota was hiding. Furthermore, according to US Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, "Since questions were first raised about possible safety defects, we have been pushing Toyota to take measures to protect consumers. While Toyota is taking responsible action now, it unfortunately took an enormous effort to get to this point. We're not finished with Toyota and are continuing to review possible defects and monitor the implementation of the recalls." Wow. If GM so much as had a defective heater fan switch in 5000 Pontiacs built in December 2006 people would be decrying the lack of quality at GM and saying that they didn't know how to build decent cars. Meanwhile, at Toyota, millions of Americans can be put at risk every day and most Americans are oblivious and actively defend them. In 2005 Toyota recalled nearly a million cars because of a defect in the steering and suspension system including problems with the ball joints. That's a major issue. Ball joints connect the steering knuckle to the rest of the suspension.
So Toyota keeps cranking out problematic products and people keep buying them believing that Toyota is infallible. For years people have blasted the American auto industry for putting out shoddy products and not wanting to own up to it and fix the problems. Now it is coming to light that Toyota has been doing the exact same thing. I wonder how many people will wise up and realize that Toyota is neither perfect nor perfectly evil. They are a huge corporation managing several different product lines across multiple continents. That's difficult. They should correct some flaws in their corporate culture: they demand yearly cost reductions from suppliers, they pressure workers in Japan to accept pro-management union leaders, they don't let their various international units make independent decisions about products and require that all product evaluations go through top management in Japan. When Wal-Mart does those kinds of things Americans protest. When Toyota does it people line up to buy their products. Toyota could crap in the corner and call it chocolate ice cream and Americans would line up with spoons.
Now Toyota is feeling the backlash. After 30 years of being a media and public darling people are starting to evaluate them in a harsher light. I hope this will bring more balance to peoples' perceptions about Toyota. They're not perfect.
Those days are over. Toyota, in its desire to become the world's largest automaker, has made many missteps as of late. Toyota has earned a reputation for quality and reliability. No automaker always makes 100% perfect products all the time. Toyota has been close enough to that for long enough that they were beyond reproach. They entered the American market with small cars that were well-made and didn't feel cheap or junky. They moved upscale with their initial buyers so that as people who bought Corollas in the early 80s aged Toyota had larger and nicer cars available for them to buy.
Now the veil is being lifted on Toyota. It turns out that they're not perfect, they're just good at hiding and/or ignoring problems. http://money.cnn.com/2010/02/04/autos/prius_timeline/ From the aforementioned article: "Toyota has known about brake problems in its popular Prius cars for some time, going so far as to fix it in new production vehicles, but has kept Prius drivers in the dark about the problem until the Japanese government called for an investigation." What? Saintly Toyota did not think they needed to notify owners of problems with their brakes? The standard line to excuse any Toyota recall is always "But they're Toyota; they are always honest and try and take care of their customers. That's why people trust them." People only trusted Toyota because they didn't know what Toyota was hiding. Furthermore, according to US Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, "Since questions were first raised about possible safety defects, we have been pushing Toyota to take measures to protect consumers. While Toyota is taking responsible action now, it unfortunately took an enormous effort to get to this point. We're not finished with Toyota and are continuing to review possible defects and monitor the implementation of the recalls." Wow. If GM so much as had a defective heater fan switch in 5000 Pontiacs built in December 2006 people would be decrying the lack of quality at GM and saying that they didn't know how to build decent cars. Meanwhile, at Toyota, millions of Americans can be put at risk every day and most Americans are oblivious and actively defend them. In 2005 Toyota recalled nearly a million cars because of a defect in the steering and suspension system including problems with the ball joints. That's a major issue. Ball joints connect the steering knuckle to the rest of the suspension.
So Toyota keeps cranking out problematic products and people keep buying them believing that Toyota is infallible. For years people have blasted the American auto industry for putting out shoddy products and not wanting to own up to it and fix the problems. Now it is coming to light that Toyota has been doing the exact same thing. I wonder how many people will wise up and realize that Toyota is neither perfect nor perfectly evil. They are a huge corporation managing several different product lines across multiple continents. That's difficult. They should correct some flaws in their corporate culture: they demand yearly cost reductions from suppliers, they pressure workers in Japan to accept pro-management union leaders, they don't let their various international units make independent decisions about products and require that all product evaluations go through top management in Japan. When Wal-Mart does those kinds of things Americans protest. When Toyota does it people line up to buy their products. Toyota could crap in the corner and call it chocolate ice cream and Americans would line up with spoons.
Now Toyota is feeling the backlash. After 30 years of being a media and public darling people are starting to evaluate them in a harsher light. I hope this will bring more balance to peoples' perceptions about Toyota. They're not perfect.