While that is quite funny, I am now even more not going to buy a Toyota.

Gee, what's the big surprise? Toyota is in the business of selling cars, any way they can.

There is quite a bit of truth in the South Park Episode on Smug, Toyota is just good in exploiting that and I can't really blame them for it.

Sure, in an ideal world companies would act on a conscience, but companies aren't individuals, they don't have it, and if a compan is owned by many individuals herd mentality sets in.

Or differently: Don't expect ANY car manufacturer NOT to produce a vehicle they think they can sell for a profit. REgardless of what the environmental impact is. Be it Honda, VW, Mercedes or GM, none nof them will stop selling something they can make a profit on.

This is fantastic! Keep the pressure on them. Toy does not deserve a free green pass.

With VW releasing the new 50 state legal diesels for '08 that get 60mpg highway AND can burn biodiesel AND last 3 times longer than a gasoline engine AND are based on tried and true technology AND are much more of a real car, the Prius as it exists now will start to become marginalized. Get that PHEV Prius out, or suffer the market consequences.

Yes, the Tundra is a roach that is inappropriate for the times. It will, however, go away all on it's own. The price of fuel will sort this one out.

It runs on gas. Say no more.

"activists from the Freedom from Oil Campaign hacked the New York Auto Show with this banner."

And by "hacked" you actually mean vandalized, right?

"“Building Priuses does not give Toyota license to mass-produce the Tundra,” said Sarah Connolly, the co-director of the Freedom from Oil campaign for Rainforest Action Network."

I think what Sarah Connolly, and her fellow-jihadis seem to ignore, is that Toyota doesn't require a "license" to manufacture whatever they want -- certainly not from the Rainforest whatever network. Sanctimonious moralists like Connelly seem to think that we need to get their approval, and that they are in a position to dictate to us what we can and can't do. That strikes me as outrageously high-handed.

They also seem to have this mistaken idea that if Toyota, or any other manufacturer, didn't build trucks, that it would never occur to anyone to buy one. Toyota, like most any other business, produces things for which there is a proven demand.

By complete coincidence, I was just at a Nissan dealer today, and I took a new Titan for a test drive. Although it's early days, and I'm really still just "kicking tires", knowing that I'll be giving the finger to a self-satisfied, moralizing prigs like this, I'm that much closer to signing the sales contract. Thanks for helping me make up my mind.

No matter how hard you try, you can not repeal the laws of supply and demand.

Hey "nobody special", your name sums you up quite nicely. You're just a typical "sheeple" who does exactly what the marketing departments of big companies want you to do. Market demand? You mean the demands that the marketers tell you to have, right? Dope? Of course you think you are making a statement by "giving the finger to a self-satisfied, moralizing prigs like this". But the statement you are making is that you are simply a boorish goon, who's too stooopid to be selfish enough to realize that wastefulness hurts you and your family as well.

Hey, better hurry off to the radio, I think your pal Rush is making chirping sounds from his safe little tree.

TLo,

Interesting idea, that cosumers buy based on demand that is entirely independant of companies...so the 2% of global gdp spent on marketing has nothing to do with consumption patterns?

That's pretty Naive.

By in large we have stoped needing things and started wanting things. Companies have stopped supplying our needs and are now largely involved in creating 'wants' to shift there products.

There is significant scope for creating want that align with environmental responsibility. Embracing this 'green' strategy is becoming more popular...progressive buinesses being not just passively responsible but creating value from products that dont destroy the planet.

I'd like to add another note as someone up there was mentioning the new VW and running on BioDiesel.

Do you actually know how much Fossil Fuel is being used to create Biodiesel? You have to grow the crops which requires oil to run the machines, fertilizers and pesizides that go into. You have to distill it, clean it up and distribute etc.

"BioFuels" or "Renewal Fuels" aren't really that sustainable either, just because you remove the use of oil a step or two from you nozzle doesn't mean it isn't in there anyways.

The only solution *I* see is to go to an electric car OR a hydrogene based economy that uses Windpower etc. to generate it.

But that would require a huge amount of upfront investement and I do not see anybody come up with that anytime soon.

Willy Bio wrote:

"Hey "nobody special", your name sums you up quite nicely."

Yes, I rather think it does, thank you. Besides, I didn't want to ruin the exclusive cachet of specialness for folks like you.

"You're just a typical "sheeple" who does exactly what the marketing departments of big companies want you to do."

So, if these marketing departments want me to buy, for example, a Prius, then I'd be some sort of bold iconoclast? Because, I'm pretty sure these marketing departments at big companies want me to buy one of those, as well. At least judging from the all the advertising for that product.

"Market demand? You mean the demands that the marketers tell you to have, right?"

Well, of course. But then, I lack the sophistication to be able to resist their hypnotic seductions. Unlike you, I presume?

"Dope? Of course you think you are making a statement by "giving the finger to a self-satisfied, moralizing prigs like this". But the statement you are making is that you are simply a boorish goon, who's too stooopid"

Hmm, you seem to have proven me right, Willy.

" to be selfish enough to realize that wastefulness hurts you and your family as well."

I may be selfish, but I'm pretty sure buying the vehicle I prefer doesn't make me wasteful. I've discussed this with my wife, who has veto power on this purchase, and she said she's not quite sure how either of us would be "harmed" by a Nissan Titan vs. some other vehicle, but she says she's willing the take the gamble. But we do thank you for your warm concern for our well-being.

"Hey, better hurry off to the radio, I think your pal Rush is making chirping sounds from his safe little tree."

I'm not really sure what you're talking about, other than you apparently don't like this "Rush", or radios, or something? Are radios wasteful, too?

Calvin wrote:

"Interesting idea, that cosumers buy based on demand that is entirely independant of companies...so the 2% of global gdp spent on marketing has nothing to do with consumption patterns?"

Does marketing supercede supply and demand? If that's true, everyday I'm exposed to many more clever ads for pantyhose and women's deodorant products than anything else.

And yet, I have never purchased either of these items. With all those millions spent on advertising pantyhose, somehow, I have managed to resist.

"By in large we have stoped needing things and started wanting things."

And that's supposed to be a bad thing?

"Companies have stopped supplying our needs and are now largely involved in creating 'wants' to shift there products."

Well, that sounds like a pretty vague, not to mention dubious, economic theory. I'd like to see the data to support that statement. But since your conception of "need" vs. "want" is entirely arbitrary and can mean whatever you please, I won't hold my breath.

OK, so you're saying:

You are immune to marketing

and

You don't know of what Rush I speak of

Okidoki

and Yoko didn't know who John Lennon was when she met him.

Have at it, slick. Buy your Titan to haul your palettes of milk and beer home from the Quickimart. Oh wait, if you actually needed a true work truck, you wouldn't touch the Titan or the Tundra with a 12 foot ladder. Poser! :D

Michael, you're right that biofuel from virgin stock is currently an environmental boondoggle. But, things are progressing in a highly compressed timescale. Had you heard about biodiesel 3 years ago? Probably not. Ethanol? Maybe, but not in today's context.

Give it another 5 years and you will see cellulosic ethanol and biodiesel from algae.

Sure, EVs would be wonderful, but not so much if most of them are still getting their juice from coal fired plants. Also, liquid fuels will still be the most efficient means of storing energy for transport for a long time. Some day batteries will surpass them, but that is definitely a ways off.

Sorry What the hell do you think subsidized the research and manufacture of the Prius? SUV and Truck sales. If it wasn't for them the Pruis would not exist. It only became profitable in 2006.

As much as I am disappointed in Toyota for taking the side of the AAM in the CO2 debate, the questions that come to mind for me are:

1) Did any automobile manufacturer not take the side of the AAM?
2) Besides Honda, is there any car manufacturer out there that's doing more for the environmentally minded than Toyota?

Yes, Toyota is targeting a marketshare that is environmentally unsustainable. But the money is there...and IF (note the emphasis) Toyota decides to take those profits to reinvest into further environmentally friendly technologies that can deliver the torque/horsepower requirements for the needs of that marketshare?

Then it becomes a situation of "The Ends Justify The Means" -- I'm not happy with it, but it's better than the alternative (pardon the pun) of Toyota just being another money-grubbing car company.

Nobody Special- As far as marketing efforts are concerned, I’m wondering why you think you need a Nissan Titan? I grew up on a farm in Middlebury Vermont where we needed large work vehicles. I haven’t personally investigated the Titan, but Nissan is a respected company when it comes to heavy trucks and I don’t doubt its quality. If you are considering buying a Titan I assume you live on a farm and have a need for such a vehicle. Otherwise I can’t see the rational behind buying a pickup truck, they aren’t large enough for a family, they get terrible mileage (after all they are designed for transporting durable goods, not commuting) and they aren’t great in winter weather (no weight in the back). So many people seem to believe they need an SUV or a pickup for safety or winter driving, but here on the farm we have always stuck to front wheel drive cars for our personal transportation. If you have your driveway plowed you will never need the clearance of a truck and the all-wheel drive coupled with the low center of gravity for cars like Subaru’s and Volvos make them much more stable in icy conditions. I have a friend who is a state trooper and he says that the vast majority of the cars he finds upside down in the median during the winter are SUVs.
People seem to get vehicles like these as status symbols. Pickups certainly have their place and I don’t hold it against Toyota for trying to meet the demands of the American market. Having worked on a farm however, I would prefer that automobile companies work on the fuel economy of their vehicles. Yes I need towing capacity in certain situation, but that doesn’t mean I’m not concerned about gas prices. Frankly small farming isn’t going to be able to survive higher gas prices and there are no options for efficient vehicles.
While you may not be concerned about the effect supporting inefficient vehicles has on the options available to farmers, or how it hurts American manufacturers by encouraging them to produce vehicles that don’t sell well on the global market, I’m surprised at your view of wants and needs. I certainly don’t want some one to tell me what to do, even if it’s the right thing, and sometimes that makes me want to do it a whole lot less. But I’m much more concerned about subtle invasions of my personal preferences. If marketing efforts have encouraged me to buy something I don’t need and convinced me that it makes me happy, I would feel a lot more “used” than if someone convinced me to do something through a logical argument. Independence is very important to me and I try to make sure I know why I make the decisions I make. I hope your Titan helps you on the farm or with your contracting business.

JiltedCitizen-- Actually the Prius came out in Japan in 1997. At the time Toyota had very little interest in SUVs or trucks and the funding for the Prius came from their sales of other small, efficient cars. The big three are the only automobile manufacturers in the world that make the majority of their income on SUV’s and in fact lose money on car sales. Even though European and Asian companies have trucks and SUV’s now, most of their money is still coming from worldwide car sales in countries where people need efficient vehicles.
While the Prius may have just recently become profitable for Toyota, it has always been a good economic choice in countries with high gas prices (i.e. nearly every country but the US). In America it currently takes seven years to make back the extra $3,000 cost of the Prius over something like a Honda Civic, but that payback period is a lot shorter when gas prices include heavy government taxation as they do in European and Asian countries.

Patrick Corcoran - Toyota had little interest? Then why where there pickups and SUV's already out Tacoma, 4runner and Land cruiser? Because there is a HUGE profit margin on them. Toyota had interest in pickups and SUV's that is why they have more now. They make money.

Well I'm glad people got the message on Toyota pushing these large trucks. I've bashed them in the last few weeks so I won't bother with that here.

Here's what Toyota should do, be the first company to get a diesel in their full size trucks.

What you say, but GM, Ford and Dodge have diesel engine pickups. Yes but these are all heavy versions such as Fords F250 etc. Right now no one in the US sells a diesel "standard duty" pickup. From what I hear Ford and GM are planning to have these in a few years.

Not entirely true. There have been some diesel non heavy duty trucks and cars, especially from Opel for GM.

Patrick Corcoran -

"As far as marketing efforts are concerned, I’m wondering why you think you need a Nissan Titan?"

Who says I "need" one? I think you're missing the entire point.

"If you are considering buying a Titan I assume you live on a farm and have a need for such a vehicle. Otherwise I can’t see the rational behind buying a pickup truck, they aren’t large enough for a family, they get terrible mileage (after all they are designed for transporting durable goods, not commuting) and they aren’t great in winter weather (no weight in the back)."

The fact that you can't see the rational is irrelevant. I'm spending my own money, not yours. I've owned several pickups, both 2WD and 4WD, and an SUV. I'm well-aware of how they perform, and am not overly concerned about the mileage. I'm also probably more familiar with how pickups handle in the winter, being in rural northern Canada. By the way, the solution to having no weight in the back, is to (surprise!) put some weight in the back. It is a pickup truck, after all.

"So many people seem to believe they need an SUV or a pickup for safety or winter driving, but here on the farm we have always stuck to front wheel drive cars for our personal transportation."

Well, that's fine for you, then. Around here, probably more than 80% of the vehicles on the road are full-size 4WD pickups. You seem to be falling into the trap of thinking the yardstick you use to measure is good enough for everyone else. We've got our own yardsticks, thanks.

"People seem to get vehicles like these as status symbols."

Personally, I'm not too concerned why other people buy the vehicles they do, and so I haven't interviewed them as to whether they buy them as "status symbols". If they did, then it still wouldn't bother me. Why on Earth would I care? Do I want to deprive them of their percieved status? I've got better things to worry about. Besides, when 80% of your neighbours already drive a large truck, how would that confer any special "status"?

But I don't get it. What's this busy-body obsession with whether someone else has what you feel is a "status symbol", of which you obviously disapprove? Is it jealousy?

"If you have your driveway plowed you will never need the clearance of a truck"

What's a driveway?

"While you may not be concerned about the effect supporting inefficient vehicles has on the options available to farmers,"

Correct. I'm not concerned about that.

"or how it hurts American manufacturers by encouraging them to produce vehicles that don’t sell well on the global market,"

That's odd. They seem to be selling lots of trucks in the local market, which, by the way, is the one I occupy. I'll let the manufacturers worry about what they do or don't sell on the global market, since they don't pay me to fret over it. And I'm pretty sure Ford, at the very least, sells plenty of trucks overseas, too. And I'm willing to bet Nissan doesn't move a lot of Titans in Japan, so I'm not sure what you're getting at.

"I’m surprised at your view of wants and needs."

If it only came down to "needs", then I'd be living in a mud hut, eating insects. I've opted for something better. Interesting that my choices seem to inspire such vituperation in certain types of people.

Come to think of it, it's actually not that interesting, really.

I said “had” not “has”. I completely agree with you that trucks are profitable for everyone. I know that when you buy an SUV from an American company for $20,000 you are actually getting a truck that might have cost $5,000 to manufacture, where as an American car that costs the same might have cost the company more than they can sell it for. However, at the time Toyota was developing the Prius their SUV/pickup sales were not (and are not as far as I know) their main moneymaker like they are for US companies. Therefore the development of the Prius was not subsidized by truck and SUV sales, it was subsidized by Toyotas still profitable sales of efficient cars.

I am not in any way trying to say that sales of SUVs are unprofitable. All companies will continue to make them as long as people want them and can afford the gas. If you want to ignore the environmental issues associated with large vehicles for people who don’t have a use for them, you still have the problem of international sales. In the USA and Canada average people can afford to drive SUV’s because of our low gas prices. The cost of gas at the pump in other countries may consist 50% or more of taxes and most people will not be able to afford inefficient vehicles. There is also the issue of space. I lived in Ireland for a brief time and I’ve seen that there is no room for large vehicles in their towns and cities. I had to back up at intersections more than a few times to allow Landrovers to make a 90 degree turn. In the US I’ve only had to do that for semi’s carrying logs and livestock. The fact that US companies continue to make large, inefficient vehicles and lose money on their smaller cars mean that they will not be able to compete on the global market.

There is too much emphasis on making SUVs in America. Its not like we haven’t done this before, we had two oil crises and the automobile manufacturers had a hard time adjusting their factories to produce efficient cars. Even if you don’t believe in global warming, even if you don’t believe in peak oil, you still have to believe that more Americans are buying cars every day and that emerging countries like China and India will soon have a huge demand for automobiles and oil to power them. I think the profitability of SUVs today might be blinding the car companies to trends in the near future that could completely cripple them. If Toyota, Honda, BMW etc. can’t sell any more SUVs they have their profitable cars to fall back on. What do Ford and GM have to fall back on if the market changes?

I said “had” not “has”. I completely agree with you that trucks are profitable for everyone. I know that when you buy an SUV from an American company for $20,000 you are actually getting a truck that might have cost $5,000 to manufacture, where as an American car that costs the same might have cost the company more than they can sell it for. However, at the time Toyota was developing the Prius their SUV/pickup sales were not (and are not as far as I know) their main moneymaker like they are for US companies. Therefore the development of the Prius was not subsidized by truck and SUV sales, it was subsidized by Toyotas still profitable sales of efficient cars.

I am not in any way trying to say that sales of SUVs are unprofitable. All companies will continue to make them as long as people want them and can afford the gas. If you want to ignore the environmental issues associated with large vehicles for people who don’t have a use for them, you still have the problem of international sales. In the USA and Canada average people can afford to drive SUV’s because of our low gas prices. The cost of gas at the pump in other countries may consist 50% or more of taxes and most people will not be able to afford inefficient vehicles. There is also the issue of space. I lived in Ireland for a brief time and I’ve seen that there is no room for large vehicles in their towns and cities. I had to back up at intersections more than a few times to allow Landrovers to make a 90 degree turn. In the US I’ve only had to do that for semi’s carrying logs and livestock. The fact that US companies continue to make large, inefficient vehicles and lose money on their smaller cars mean that they will not be able to compete on the global market.

There is too much emphasis on making SUVs in America. Its not like we haven’t done this before, we had two oil crises and the automobile manufacturers had a hard time adjusting their factories to produce efficient cars. Even if you don’t believe in global warming, even if you don’t believe in peak oil, you still have to believe that more Americans are buying cars every day and that emerging countries like China and India will soon have a huge demand for automobiles and oil to power them. I think the profitability of SUVs today might be blinding the car companies to trends in the near future that could completely cripple them. If Toyota, Honda, BMW etc. can’t sell any more SUVs they have their profitable cars to fall back on. What do Ford and GM have to fall back on if the market changes?