8th Most Valuable Brand, Toyota, Leads World Auto Sales
The world’s no.8 most valuable brand, Toyota, has taken the crown as the highest selling automobile for third consecutive year with 10.23 million vehicles in 2014 and its brand value also increased by a whopping 20 percent to $42,392 million according to Interbrand.
Toyota leadership, driven by record US deliveries of its sport-utility vehicle including the compact RAV4 and mid-size Highlander paced Toyota’s US market share gain last year, spurring plans to boost local production and exports from Japan in 2015. And in Japan, demand increased aggressively, where the consumption tax increase last year had brought forward many purchases for 2015 to 2014.
In Nigeria, Toyota at best, a glorified trade-post, is still the leading auto brand. The freeze in building more factories anywhere in the world arises as a result of the 2009 and 2010 tsunami natural disaster and recall over ‘acceleration’ problems in some markets.
Moreover, Toyota is eager to rebrand outside of the “staid and boring image” and “reasonably priced, reliable products” to “race cars and luxury models”, green technology, gas-electric hybrid, and “more futuristic technology called fuel cells”.
The big markets focus like China, a more attractive place to do business, will continue to make Toyota in Nigeria an import-trade-post market for a long while yet, especially now that purchasing power of households are reducing fast.
The economic challenges of continuous oil revenue decline, a dollar exchange rate currently standing at N204 to a dollar forcing devaluation, a stock market exchange market whose bench mark has gone down by 30 per cent and a steep fall in government spending, there seems not to be a quick end in sight.
Several of the companies parading themselves as made in Nigeria are just doing expedient reasons, with inflation rising and the cost of living index and imports being affected and foreign exchange in short supply, many may show their true colour indeed.
Added to the above, the new automobile policy of government may turn Toyota vehicle to join the premium-category-not-by-choice.
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