Projo Cars Blog

You've got to hand it to Honda: It sure outplayed its big rival Toyota on the truck front.

Unlike Honda, whose only venture into the truck market was the mid-size, 4-door Ridgeline with its shortened bed, Toyota, known not only for its marketing savvy but for producing first-rate products, fell into the U.S. full-size truck market with its Tundra just at the wrong time, according to USA Today.

Sales of the vehicle, which was introduced three years ago, were off 42 percent in July compared with a year ago. And it has temporarily shut down production at its dedicated factory outside San Antonio, Texas.

The U.S. pickup truck market is distinctive for a number of reasons. It is uniquely American, which I think of as a descendant of the horse-drawn buckboard that was ubiquitous in rural communities through the 19th Century. As such, there is a limited market for them in Asia or Europe.

And because it has such a hold on the American imagination, brand loyalty is mixed up with notions of freedom, virility and patriotism and is particularly strong.

The success of the Ford F-150, for example, is legendary. But loyalty to the Chevrolet Silverado, for example, is equally strong. Toyota's recent entry into NASCAR can thus be seen as an attempt to earn the bedrock loyalty of heartland Americans.

Finally, the pickup truck market is incredibly profitable. That was what kept Detroit producing them during the 1990s and the early part of this century as storm clouds were looming in terms of increased global demand for energy, which would inevitably push up prices, and a growing body of evidence that the pollution caused by big engines was contributing to climate change.

Now the market has switched to smaller cars and while Detroit is struggling to move out of big vehicles, Toyota, which already has a solid share of small, fuel-efficient cars let alone the iconic hybrid in the Prius, is lumbered by its errant foray into trucks.

Such are the reassuring ways of the world when even the great and mighty prove as fallible as you or me.

- Peter C.T. Elsworth

 Tags  auto sales Honda Pickup trucks Toyota

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