The 2012 Toyota Camry will now roll into showrooms by mid-September.
Anxious to rebuild demand after six months of product shortages, Toyota says it will launch its new 2012 Camry sedan in mid-September, about two weeks ahead of its original schedule.
Camry is just one of 10 product launches Toyota is scheduling over the next year, with a mix of crossovers, sedans and even its first plug-in hybrid on the calendar, but no single model is more important than Camry which has been the nation’s best-selling passenger car for the last nine years running – and 13 of the last 14 years.
The decision to move up the on-sale date of the new midsize sedan — originally planned for October 3rd — was announced during a conference call with reporters discussing the maker’s weak August sales numbers. Toyota posted a 13% decline for the month. That was better than the 24% dip posted by its Japanese rival, Honda, but a sharp contrast with the double-digit increases in demand reported by Detroit’s Big Three – as well as the third member of the Japanese Big Three, Nissan.
The downturn – which came despite a steady ramp-up in Toyota’s incentives – caps months of decline largely the result of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami that effectively shut down the Japanese auto industry for a month and then left makers struggling to deal with parts shortages. With a disproportionate share of its products produced in Japan, the situation hit the world’s largest automaker hardest.
But Toyota has also been struggling to put some other problems behind it, notably the quality and safety scandals of 2010. Recent reports, such as the much-quoted J.D. Power Initial Quality Survey, show the maker is getting quality back on track. But it is also facing increasingly tough competition in key segments, such as the midsize sedan market, from competitors such as Hyundai, which can barely keep up with demand for its latest Sonata model.
So, with all but the last of its factories back to normal Toyota is racing to bring key new products, such as Camry, to market as quickly as possible. And it plans to back up the debut of the new midsize sedan with the largest ad campaign in its corporate history.
Analysts say that will be particularly critical — and for several reasons. It’s always a challenge ensuring potential customers know when a new product rolls into showrooms – especially in today’s crowded market.
But Toyota is also aiming to overwhelm some of the initial reviews for the new Camry, including one in TheDetroitBureau.com (Click Here for the review) that have not been especially flattering. Critics have questioned the Japanese maker’s claim, among other things, that the 2012 model is essentially all-new and an example of revolutionary, rather than evolutionary changes.
The new car still received better reviews, overall, than the 2012 Honda Civic, however, which was sorely lambasted by critics including influential Consumer Reports magazine, but industry analysts question whether the two largest Japanese makers will be able to regain their past momentum coming out of the 2011 product shortages.
For his part, Bob Carter, who oversees the Toyota brand in the U.S., acknowledges it will be tougher going forward, but Camry will play a critical part. And there, he insists, there will be no wavering. The midsize sedan, he promised during its public unveiling, last month, “will continue to earn its position as America’s number one-selling passenger car.”
Just how much it will take to hold that ranking remains to be seen. But rolling out the 2012 Toyota Camry a few weeks early underscores the maker’s determination.