Toyota Makes Exec Changes as February Sales Fall

Toyota U.S. deliveries fell 7.2% in February to 174,339 on a volume and daily-selling-rate basis, as losses due to declining fleet sales impacted its overall performance, a top official says.

“We’ve got 8,000-10,000 less fleet,” Bill Fay, group vice president-Toyota Div. for Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A., tells WardsAuto in an interview during a media preview for the forthcoming C-HR CUV in Austin, TX.

“Usually (fleet sales are) a little bit stronger (early in the year), but that’s just the way the fleet seems to be rolling out – that was a big part of our January miss, too,” Fay says.

Toyota sales declined 11.3% in January vs. year-ago, also on a volume and DSR basis.

In February, Toyota again suffered a loss on the car side, while light trucks gained and certain models posted monthly records.

Toyota Div. cars, which includes former Scion models, fell 14.6%, while Toyota Div. light trucks gained 14.3% on February 2016.

Standouts on the light-truck side included the RAV4 midsize CUV, up 3.2% to 26,351 sales, the model’s best-ever February tally. Some 3,080 units were RAV4 hybrids, a 25.1% jump from year-ago.

The Sequoia large SUV, 4Runner midsize SUV and Highlander large CUV posted gains of 23.6%, 28.7% and 27.8%, respectively, with the latter two models also having best-ever February totals.

On the car side, the Camry and Corolla remained Toyota’s best-sellers, but deliveries of 27,498 and 27,161 units, respectively, nevertheless represented 15.1% and 11.4% drop-offs.

Continuing its long slide, the Prius lineup declined 14.3%, with the year-old liftback variant down 24.4%.

Sales of Toyota’s Tacoma (up 0.6%) and Tundra pickups (down 12.9%) were weak.

At Lexus, sales fell 20.6% as cars and utilities both lost ground, but cars by far had it worse. Lexus car sales plunged 38.3%, while light trucks declined 7.0%, with all four models down.

Toyota in its monthly sales release gives no reason for the Lexus decline, but notes Lexus utility-vehicle inventory is “healthy” heading into March.

Fay cites declining fleet sales in projecting first-quarter performance will lag Q1 2016 results, but he expects the second and third quarters to run above year-ago.

“First quarter, we’re going to be off year-over-year and it’ll almost all be fleet, and then we’ll catch up to that (decline in the) second and third quarters,” he says. “It’s really just a pattern.”

Meanwhile, Toyota today announces it is shuffling its executive ranks, promoting several TMSUSA executives, including Fay.

Effective April 1, Fay becomes senior vice president-automotive operations for Toyota and Lexus in the U.S. He replaces Bob Carter in the role. Carter will transition to executive vice president-sales for Toyota Motor North America and also carry the titles of president-TMSUSA and executive general manager-Toyota Motor Corp.

Jack Hollis, currently group vice president- marketing for Toyota Div. at TMSUSA, will assume Fay’s current role of group vice president-Toyota Div.

Further, Kazuo Ohara, president and CEO-TMSUSA, is returning to Japan to become a global advisor to TMC.

Several changes also are made at Toyota Motor North America, including Tetsuo Ogawa replacing Osamu Nagata as executive vice president and chief administrative officer. Nagata returns to Japan to become EVP and CFO for TMC. He also is being promoted from a senior managing officer at TMC to a member of the board of directors. Toyota reportedly is reducing its board members from 11 to nine to speed decision-making, Reuters says.

Ogawa will report to Jim Lentz, CEO-TMNA, who says in a statement, “We will all benefit from the leadership of the newly appointed executive team and others as we put in place our new structure for One Toyota.”

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