bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

BippuLexus

Yes. For the CLS, specifically, it EU-market sells more. But for the 6 Series, the 6 Series in the US-Market sells more. I'm talking about the average earlier. On average - it feels like the CLS, 6 Series and A6 are bought at a similar-rate when comparing US/EU market sales.

And earlier - I was replying to Situman - where he claims EU-Market sells "substantially higher." His quote: "What are the sales for the CLS, BMW 6, A7 and GS overseas? I'm willing to bet it is substantially higher."
- I was just trying to show him that its not "substantially higher" but rather its just about the same - on average. If anything, the EU-Market is a little bit higher - maybe by a couple hundred cars.

Not really an excuse when its true. MB/BMW had way more time to develop more cars than Lexus did. It would be impossible for Lexus to have the exact same amount offerings as MB/BMW in 30 years. If Lexus was 50 years old, then I would more-or-less agree the age is an excuse.

Like I said before - "offering vehicle selection" doesn't make a company half into the competition. If that's really the case, Jaguar, Range Rover, Maserati, and Alfa would be in the half competition as well. A company doesn't need to offer a tons of vehicles to be considered a competitive or "good" brand.

arentz07

Ah, thanks for explaining. Yeah if anything, the take-rate is a bit lower, certainly not substantially different in either direction.

Also the longevity thing is pretty much an excuse. Toyota has been a huge automaker for a while now, so having economies of scale is not a problem for them, even in the luxury segment.

situman

Read my post again. I said overseas, not specific to Europe.

situman

You forgot to ask him what's the take rate of the GS vs all those models overseas (as in rest of world, not just europe).

BippuLexus

Lexus has been producing vehicles for only 30 years compared to MB/BMW's 100 years. While Toyota has been at it for a long time, they are still relatively new to the luxury market compared to MB/BMW.

I know you stated "overseas". I took an example from the EU-Market. Based off the EU-Market example, the difference wouldn't be "substantially higher". You can pretty much assume the Asia-Market would be the same. The 4-door coupes just don't really sell and that's just a fact. Its more of an "image" thing like someone else stated earlier.

Allen K

iTrader: (4)

It does not take 20 years to develop a single car. The main reason why Lexus does not have as many options as the Germans is because their management values production efficiency and sales over niche vehicles. It's the same reason why they region lock certain option packages

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

lexus launched with a massive 1-2 punch, in 1989 with 2 sedans (ls, es) and then in 1991 with a stylish sc coupe and gs sedan. at that time this was mercedes line-up (hopefully i've categorized it right):

mid size sedans and wagon: 190D / 190E-2.6 / 260E / 300E / 300TE
coupes 300CE
big sedan 300SE / 300SEL / 420SEL / 560SEL
big coupe 560SEC
touring coupe 560SL

not really a giant line-up then.

lexus was the catalyst that made the german brands really wake up, and followed up with more genius moves in late '90s with the segment-creating RX300 and the GS300/400 threat to the 'establishment'.

from there... not so much (gx/lx came from toyota models, ct, hs failures), although the nx was a great move.

a company can offer whatever it likes of course and no one can legitimately say jaguar etc are direct competitors to german brands, but also lexus cannot be considered direct competition to the german brands with (still) a limited offering. lexus makes fine vehicles and of course is continuing to add (lc, ux) and subtract models (ct) so we'll see how this plays out.

ok i'll buy that.

situman

Question for you. How do you state something is a fact and then use the word "probably?" So is it a fact or a guess?

situman

Why would you only use the EU market? Use worldwide sales.

BippuLexus

Yes. While management of Toyota/Lexus is slow and conservative, their company is still young.

It doesn't take 20 years to develop a car but it takes at least 2-3 years. This is why Lexus can't develop a profile with a similar vehicle offering as MB/BMW in less than 30 years - especially in the early years they were still trying to make a name for themselves. Lexus is exactly only 29 years old - its literally created on the year I was born. That's extremely young compared to how long the Germans have been doing their luxury-car game.


So you are saying Lexus don't compete with MB/BMW/Audi because they offer less cars? I'm sorry, I just don't buy that. If that was the case, the Lexus RX/NX shouldn't be destroying the X3/X5 sales. If Lexus isn't a "true competitor", then MB/BMW should not no problem destroying Lexus in SUV sales but it don't.
There are so many luxury companies, (that offer less vehicles than Lexus), that are stated as competition to the Germans. Why should Lexus be the exception from this rule?

Saying Lexus isn't a direct competitor to MB/BMW/Audi is similar to someone going around saying "MB/BMW isn't a true competitor to Lexus when their car tends to break down after 30K miles."

Question for you. Did you know "fact is" is more of a figure of speech? I wasn't saying its literally a fact.

Because the EU-Market gives an in-depth detail of sales for each car. For a market, say like China, they only provide sales #'s for the whole brand.
MB and BMW both average about 35K-40K car sales per year - across all models. I guess you can assume that the CLS and 6 Series only make up a small percentage of that?

End result - no matter how you twist it - the CLS and 6 Series don't sell that much worldwide. The biggest markets are US, EU and China. If they don't sell a bunch there, they probably don't sell a bunch else where.

JDR76

May this thread die but the GS live on...

peteharvey

Global sales figures of specific luxury vehicles are difficult to come by.
However, back in 2006, my 3GS amassed 51,290 units in global production.
As a very rough comparison, in 2012 the delectable Benz CLS produced 36,825 units.

In 2006, the BMW 6 Series globally produced 21,947 units.
While in 2012, the 6 Series globally produced 23,193 units.
In 2016, the beloved 6 Series globally produced a paltry 13,400 units.

Of course, the current 4GS isn't as popular as the previous 3GS & 2GS, but I don't have any global figures for the current 4GS.

Bottom line.
If you think GS sales figures are low, wait till you see sales figures of CLS, 6 Series and A7 Fastback.


Moderator Bitkahuna ponders at why GS isn't available in bodystyle variations like fastback, wagen, coupe, convertible, landaus etc.
Toyota Motor Corp is all about $$$.
TMC is presently the wealthiest auto co in the world with equity of USD171 billion dollars.
By comparison, Daimler AG is only about USD 81 billion; less than half of TMC.
Spwolf loves this sort of thing.

We commonly see annual gross/net profits posted in the media.
Annual profits, or even an annual loss of USD 1.5 million dollars means little, when a person already owns 30 million dollars in property.
Forget annual profits/losses, and focus on net equity of assets less liabilities.

Marketing and image is important.
Thus Daimler AG spends copious amounts in F1 Racing.
Lexus spends heaps on LFA, LC and even RC coupes.

However, TMC being TMC, they don't want to spend too much $$$ on products that are costly to develop, yet produce little returns like:
1) Fastbacks, wagens, coupes, convertibles & landaus.
2) V8's, V10's and V12's.
A 3.5 V6 hybrid costs little to produce, but a V8 costs a lot to produce - though both sell poorly.
Toyota Motor Corp is smart.
They didn't just accumulate USD 171 billion by splurging on fastbacks, coupes, convertibles and V8's...

situman

yea this thread needs to die. I'll be the first to unsubscribe lol.

Allen K

iTrader: (4)

What does age have to do with developing more powerful engines? Or new derivatives of existing models a la the CLS? Absolutely nothing. There's nothing inherently wrong with focusing on models that will actually sell in meaningful numbers, but to say that Lexus can't compete because of their age is wrong. They're choosing not to compete in those segments because the ROI isn't there for them.