Toyota (TM) woes are Ford's dreams

Toyota Motors (TM) head Aiko Toyoda finally addressed the media about the recent problems regarding the acceleration pedal. In this guys opinion he should have hit the airways right way instead of waiting so long and not coming out immediately. People don't like that especially in the U.S. Now we are hearing about a problem with the brake system with the award winning Prius hybrids. We are looking at a recall of 8 million cars and 270,000 Prius's. Also the Lexus 250 Hybrid apparently has the same brake system as the Prius being that Lexus is Toyota's luxury brand.

If that's not enough you have the loss of production and surely civil lawsuits are to follow. Who knows what the U.S. Gov't is going to do. Can you imagine owning one of these right now and for the next year trying to explain all this to a customer. No thanks and who knows what they can do about it legally. When did Toyota know about this and how many people complained before they finally admitted the issue is yet to be seen? Whew! Make me tired just thinking about it.

The Japanese culture is all about "saving Face" and they don't take it lightly at all. It's embedded in every part of their life. That's why Aiko came out today. Too late? I don't know.

This can be said. People in the U.S. love their Toyota's but not at the expense of their families. I've owned several of them and they have always been great cars but it's been some time since I have.

For Ford who is clearly on the rise in terms of quality and design this opens up a major opportunity as well as the other manufacturers. Back in the 80's Audi had major problems with acceleration on their 5000 model. My father owned one of these but the Turbo which had no issue. He sold it anyway and never bought another one. Funny enough he bought a Toyota Supra which he still says was the best car he ever owned. It took many years for Audi to rebound from it especially after the 60 minutes report at that time hit the airways. Can a 60 minutes report soon hit the airways? To be seen but it has been all over the airways. I own puts on TM and believe that it will go down further as the story unfolds.

Anyway, my belief is that this Toyota issue has just started. There will be a major investigation and a Political attempt to get the Japanese to open up their auto market more for U.S. companies. They are tied together.

Surely Alan Mulally the head of Ford is going to carefully start to market this safety issue to the consumer. He can't be brash by throwing it in their face and it's not his style but also must be aggressive. Business is war. I'll be looking to buy some Ford back possibly at the end of close or Monday/Tuesday.

Stay tuned today is going to be interesting that's for sure.

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