Is Lexus failing?
08-03-06, 07:33 AM
#46
Lexus Champion
Join Date: May 2002
Location: Connecticut
Posts: 2,175
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Originally Posted by DaveGS4
No, I want nothing to do with your Sentra... but you want to buy a used LS400 that's nice and quiet? Only reaching middle age at 101K miles 
M.
08-03-06, 09:48 AM
#47
Lexus Fanatic
Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: California
Posts: 6,084
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Failure? No, I don't see this applying to Lexus. Disappointing? As I posted before, yes and growing. The third gen GS handling is only an improvement when compared to the 2d generation. Even Infiniti does a better mid size performance sedan. Now, there may be a lot of other reasons why you would not want an Infiniti but having driven both, that's my conclusion. Did the 3d gen GS make up ground on the 5? As far as I can see it was closer with the 2d gen than the third. I just don't get the impression that Lexus is that interested in devoting much resources to the GS and it shows.
I am waiting for the LS460 as much as anyone but I could care less what the pre production reviews are saying, I want to drive it for myself and see the pricing. Now, I am prone to senior moments but it seems to me that initially, and for some time, the LS had a sigfniciant price advantage over a 7. If the numbers posted in CL on the new LS pricing are correct, what might have been a 20% price advantage is going to be more like 2%. I really don't want to get into a huge debate over option lists and cherry picking pricing, I know the europeans just love being able to add 20 or 25% of the price of a car with options, but in base trims, the LS460 is not going to have much price advantage over the 7. Especially because the 7 is not demanding a premiun at all. Even around here where bimmers usually go for sticker or over, you can get a couple of grand off on a 7. After having spent a fair amount of time in a 7 I can tell you that even with the current gen run flats, just getting rid of those POS makes the 7 a much more pleasant car. Yes it still has that goofy i drive and maybe there is no way I could really buy a bimmer again but the LS will have to have more than a Lexus badge to make a sale with me. I am no longer interested in buying a Lexus and searching for shocks and stabilizer bars and bushings and washers and gaskets and on and on, to get the ride/handling I want. Especially if it is going to be the same price as a bimmer. Obviously this is a pretty narrow comparison but I also came very close to buying an XJ a couple of months ago rather than wait for the LS. And wait. And wait.
When I bought my GS430 I thought it would be the last V8 I would ever own. Of course gas price stayed relatively under control and bimmer, mercedes, GM, Chrysler, and a lot of others really spent a lot of time making hp and I thought maybe the hp - fuel mileage tradeoff favored another big hp car. You can make all the assumptions you want about how fuel mileage does not affect luxury car sales but I am not so sure. That may catch up with Lexus and the other mfrs as well. MB and bimmer have a lot of models that can get well down into the teens for mileage and that is ridiculous. So is Lexus ahead of the curve with hybrids? Not as far as I am concerned. The hybrid, especially in something like the GS merely seems to be a way to prepay for gas. Unless Toyota gets the price down to the point where there is no premium, I am not interested. I don't want to get all wound up in having it pay for itself. I am talking about getting a few extra mpg and having it cost you several thousand dollars. All I can see is that you are just prepaying for the gas. If it makes you happy to pay Toyota rather than Exxon, fine. And I have to say that after driving a 450h the last thing that car needed was a couple of hundred extra pounds. I can definitely feel it. As bad as it was to begin with, no one is going to be a 450h for trunk room either. I don't know why they even bother leaving much of any trunk there. They might just as well have made a trailer hitch standard.
So is Lexus failing? I don't realy think so. Are they going to find the luxury car market a bit harder going forward? I think you could make an argument that everyone will. The business heydays of the nineties are over and the dot com stock market is not likely to reappear anytime soon. The luxury brands really benefitted from that economy and stable gas prices and neither is likely to not return anytime soon. The days of luxury car makers keeping growth going by introducing sputes are gone, and that one is a result of gas prices. MB has pushed prices to the stratosphere but MB customers seem to relish in the price to join the club. Bimmer would like to get MB prices but can't. Can Lexus get BMW prices? Who knows. It was posted that the base price on the LS will be 67K while the 7 is based at around 73K but in reality, the 7 base is more like 70K here so the LS is not going to have much of a price advantage. They kind of made that problem with the GS sticker pricing pushing up with the 3rd gen. Maybe they are right with their pricing but if I wanted a new GS430, I could get it for around 5K off sticker and for as new as it is, well, you know how that goes.
I am waiting for the LS460 as much as anyone but I could care less what the pre production reviews are saying, I want to drive it for myself and see the pricing. Now, I am prone to senior moments but it seems to me that initially, and for some time, the LS had a sigfniciant price advantage over a 7. If the numbers posted in CL on the new LS pricing are correct, what might have been a 20% price advantage is going to be more like 2%. I really don't want to get into a huge debate over option lists and cherry picking pricing, I know the europeans just love being able to add 20 or 25% of the price of a car with options, but in base trims, the LS460 is not going to have much price advantage over the 7. Especially because the 7 is not demanding a premiun at all. Even around here where bimmers usually go for sticker or over, you can get a couple of grand off on a 7. After having spent a fair amount of time in a 7 I can tell you that even with the current gen run flats, just getting rid of those POS makes the 7 a much more pleasant car. Yes it still has that goofy i drive and maybe there is no way I could really buy a bimmer again but the LS will have to have more than a Lexus badge to make a sale with me. I am no longer interested in buying a Lexus and searching for shocks and stabilizer bars and bushings and washers and gaskets and on and on, to get the ride/handling I want. Especially if it is going to be the same price as a bimmer. Obviously this is a pretty narrow comparison but I also came very close to buying an XJ a couple of months ago rather than wait for the LS. And wait. And wait.
When I bought my GS430 I thought it would be the last V8 I would ever own. Of course gas price stayed relatively under control and bimmer, mercedes, GM, Chrysler, and a lot of others really spent a lot of time making hp and I thought maybe the hp - fuel mileage tradeoff favored another big hp car. You can make all the assumptions you want about how fuel mileage does not affect luxury car sales but I am not so sure. That may catch up with Lexus and the other mfrs as well. MB and bimmer have a lot of models that can get well down into the teens for mileage and that is ridiculous. So is Lexus ahead of the curve with hybrids? Not as far as I am concerned. The hybrid, especially in something like the GS merely seems to be a way to prepay for gas. Unless Toyota gets the price down to the point where there is no premium, I am not interested. I don't want to get all wound up in having it pay for itself. I am talking about getting a few extra mpg and having it cost you several thousand dollars. All I can see is that you are just prepaying for the gas. If it makes you happy to pay Toyota rather than Exxon, fine. And I have to say that after driving a 450h the last thing that car needed was a couple of hundred extra pounds. I can definitely feel it. As bad as it was to begin with, no one is going to be a 450h for trunk room either. I don't know why they even bother leaving much of any trunk there. They might just as well have made a trailer hitch standard.
So is Lexus failing? I don't realy think so. Are they going to find the luxury car market a bit harder going forward? I think you could make an argument that everyone will. The business heydays of the nineties are over and the dot com stock market is not likely to reappear anytime soon. The luxury brands really benefitted from that economy and stable gas prices and neither is likely to not return anytime soon. The days of luxury car makers keeping growth going by introducing sputes are gone, and that one is a result of gas prices. MB has pushed prices to the stratosphere but MB customers seem to relish in the price to join the club. Bimmer would like to get MB prices but can't. Can Lexus get BMW prices? Who knows. It was posted that the base price on the LS will be 67K while the 7 is based at around 73K but in reality, the 7 base is more like 70K here so the LS is not going to have much of a price advantage. They kind of made that problem with the GS sticker pricing pushing up with the 3rd gen. Maybe they are right with their pricing but if I wanted a new GS430, I could get it for around 5K off sticker and for as new as it is, well, you know how that goes.
08-03-06, 10:39 AM
#48
Lexus Champion
Originally Posted by 1SICKLEX
I can only hope the 350 and 460 are so fast like the 2GS was in 1998, that editors of the mags drool over the speed and overlook the handling some. (and the stock 3GS is way better than a stock 2GS). 
I still believe that the 3GS styling should have been a little more daring/aggressive. From certain angles the 3GS looks great, but from others, it's plain vanilla. Not sure a mid-cycle refresh can rectify this
As for the ES350, what a great improvement over the last generation. I had one for a weekend loaner and was very impressed.
08-03-06, 10:41 AM
#49
actually, Luxury market is growing market, and all sucessful manfuacturers should and are seeing big gains - Lexus, BMW, etc. It is very nice market to be in the USA at this point of time.
08-03-06, 10:45 PM
#51
Lexus Fanatic
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: A better place
Posts: 7,285
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Originally Posted by Och
So, if you pay attention to the sale charts, the sales of LS, GS and SC, as well as the LX and the GX models have been going down miserably. The only ones that are really selling are ES, RX and IS, but then ES and RX can hardly be considered "real" Lexus, as they are heavily based on the Camry platform. The IS is doing well, but not anywhere near as the 3 series. And this is really disappointing with the GS and LS - they used to sell a bunch of these, so what happened? I guess it is yet to be seen how the all new LS does, but the GS has just been redesigned last year and its sales are miserable, right down there with RL and Q45. I guess the upcoming engine upgrade might offset some sales, but how much? Not everybody cares about engines, take 525 for instance, its selling very well. Right now the have FOUR!!!! models that don't even sell 1000 units a month - GS430, SC430, LS430, LX430, and GS300 and GX470 are barely breaking 1000, and are on a steady downslide. I wonder how is Lexus turning profitable when 3/4 of its line up isn't selling, and obviously isn't generating profits, and the remaining 1/4 isn't really Lexus, and the profit generated by it is more to Toyotas credit, not Lexus.
3/4 of lineup isn't selling? GS430 production has STOPPED, and GS300 production is being limited to prepare for the new engines. It's not just less demand, but also less supply currently of the 3GS. Why can't all you 3GS critics understand this simple point?
People have seen the new LS, and they KNOW its coming, so obviously LS sales currently are down. LS has been a sales LEADER (in North America) in its segment for years. It seems you've been living under a rock for the past decade if you actually believe the LS as being a "failure".
All of the Lexus SUVs are old, including the RX, yet the RX continues to sell well. Lexus is taking it's time with redesigning its big SUVs because that market is shrinking, and demand is shrinking. Lexus is focusing on it's car models because they've been weaker in this before, and Lexus has typically sold lots of SUVs before. Now Lexus wants to sell more cars.
SC is a prestige model with a prestige pricetag, plus it's an old model, so sales are expected to be low. SC redesign is coming soon anyways.
08-03-06, 10:49 PM
#52
Lexus Fanatic
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: A better place
Posts: 7,285
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Originally Posted by Och
Not in the new 350, but I sat in the 300, 330 and even 250. The 330 indeed is a very nice car with gorgeous interior and awesome build quality, but I still stand by my statement. It is still largely a glorified Camry. And don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with that, but lets admit it, the only reason its sold under Lexus badge is to provide Lexus with bread and butter. What about the premium models? Look at MB and BMW, yeah the 3 series and C class are theirs bread and butter, but their premium models are selling great as well, despite being unreliable and overpriced.
BMW for years has had a problem moving their 3 Series and 5 Series buyers onto an LS, whereas Lexus ES buyers and GS buyers tend to move on to an LS.
The problem is that BMW has (and still does) emphasizes sport way too much despite being a "luxury" automaker. The 3 Series and 5 Series are all emphasized about their sporting characteristics. The 7 Series does not really fit into this that well. Sure, it's fairly sporty, but full size sedan buyers seek extravagant luxury more than sporty handling, and that is where BMW has failed to keep up with MB and Lexus with their full size sedan offering.
08-03-06, 10:53 PM
#53
Lexus Fanatic
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: A better place
Posts: 7,285
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Originally Posted by mmarshall
I don't want to cross our Administrator here, but I have to be honest. I recently reviewed a new 2007 ES350 and was not impressed with it at all. Not that it was a bad car ( it wasn't ) but IMO it was clearly not the equal of its predecessor, the ES330, which was a superb machine. The new 350 had a little more power and the usual awesome Lexus paint job, and it also retained the noise isolation of the previous car but also, IMO, had a lot of shortcomings compared to the 330. The quality of the interior hardware and materials seemed a step below the 330, there was much less wood trim ( perhaps in an effort to cut costs ), there were noticeable creaks and rattles( though minor ), and ride comfort was noticeably off that of the 330 because of the new lower-profile 55-series tires.
So if you like the car, Dave, fine......buy it and enjoy it. I'm with och, though..it didn't impress me.
So if you like the car, Dave, fine......buy it and enjoy it. I'm with och, though..it didn't impress me.
Besides, I'm quite sure you know that interior squeeks and rattles are very uncharacteristic of a Lexus, so I'm surprised that you would base your overall opinion on the ES350 going by a test drive/review of one only one ES350, when it very well could have been a lemon.
08-03-06, 10:58 PM
#54
Guest
Posts: n/a
Originally Posted by DaveGS4
My (cloudy) crystal ball on the 3rd gen GS
(known) GS350 comes out and push a small spike in sales, but not as much as Lexus hopes. GS430 sales drop to a trickle with great deals to be had.
Mors GS460 info is announced, but still missing certain key details. Will improvements push it to the 'near 400hp' level up from the LS 380hp? Is the 8 speed transmission 'too plush' for performance and the CVT will be offered to give it more sport?
In addition to the new engine, Lexus decides to push out a facelift front/rear for the 3GS to coincide with the GS460 launch. GS350 intake / exhaust are re-worked at the same time for another small increase in HP. Sales increase incrementally, but the GS460's price keeps many buyers away.
Carson Toyota group buys on the new 3GS head and taillights sell like gangbusters before Lexus decides makes you buy the entire car to get the lights.
4GS comes out a year sooner than planned.
(known) GS350 comes out and push a small spike in sales, but not as much as Lexus hopes. GS430 sales drop to a trickle with great deals to be had.
Mors GS460 info is announced, but still missing certain key details. Will improvements push it to the 'near 400hp' level up from the LS 380hp? Is the 8 speed transmission 'too plush' for performance and the CVT will be offered to give it more sport?
In addition to the new engine, Lexus decides to push out a facelift front/rear for the 3GS to coincide with the GS460 launch. GS350 intake / exhaust are re-worked at the same time for another small increase in HP. Sales increase incrementally, but the GS460's price keeps many buyers away.
Carson Toyota group buys on the new 3GS head and taillights sell like gangbusters before Lexus decides makes you buy the entire car to get the lights.
4GS comes out a year sooner than planned.
08-03-06, 11:06 PM
#55
Lexus Fanatic
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: A better place
Posts: 7,285
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
As well, I've talked about this time and time again; the purpose or goal of the 3GS more than anything was to usher in and introduce the L-Finesse styling language. Do any of you CL members honestly think Lexus wanted to release the 3GS with carryover engines, a dated Nav system, among other things? Obviously not, but the 5th gen Nav was not ready at the time of the 3GS release, the 4.6L V8 was also not ready, and because of that, Lexus had to wait on putting in the 3.5L V6 into the GS. Lexus *could not* wait for all these things because the 2GS was very old, and Lexus needed to introduce it's L-Finesse styling language; thus, the 3GS was released when it was.
For the month of July, GS450h posted solid sales of 157. Keeping in mind it is a limited production model, it's selling very well, and from what I hear, demand is exceeding supply, since only a very limited number is being produced. So obviously people do like the GS, because if the car was such a "failure" as some of you describe, then even the hybrid model wouldn't interest buyers, but clearly, it's bringing new interest to the GS.
As for the ES, the next gen ES will no longer be on the Camry platform. Next-gen RX also likely will no longer be on the Camry platform.
For the month of July, GS450h posted solid sales of 157. Keeping in mind it is a limited production model, it's selling very well, and from what I hear, demand is exceeding supply, since only a very limited number is being produced. So obviously people do like the GS, because if the car was such a "failure" as some of you describe, then even the hybrid model wouldn't interest buyers, but clearly, it's bringing new interest to the GS.
As for the ES, the next gen ES will no longer be on the Camry platform. Next-gen RX also likely will no longer be on the Camry platform.
08-04-06, 04:56 AM
#56
Lexus Test Driver
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: None
Posts: 1,169
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Originally Posted by TRDFantasy
As for the ES, the next gen ES will no longer be on the Camry platform. Next-gen RX also likely will no longer be on the Camry platform.
08-04-06, 06:18 AM
#58
Lexus Fanatic
Originally Posted by TRDFantasy
You may have had a lemon. Most ES350 owners on the forum are not really experiencing the interior problems you have had.
Besides, I'm quite sure you know that interior squeeks and rattles are very uncharacteristic of a Lexus, so I'm surprised that you would base your overall opinion on the ES350 going by a test drive/review of one only one ES350, when it very well could have been a lemon.
Besides, I'm quite sure you know that interior squeeks and rattles are very uncharacteristic of a Lexus, so I'm surprised that you would base your overall opinion on the ES350 going by a test drive/review of one only one ES350, when it very well could have been a lemon.
The new GS300AWD, however, IMO is absolutely superb in almost everything except a somewhat low roof and the flip-down dash-panel box. It and the new Acura RL, IMO, are two of the finest cars I have ever driven.
