4 Things You Didn’t Know About Toyota

Toyota is one of the world’s most successful car companies. Stand on any busy street in Philadelphia and you’ll see a Toyota vehicle pass by within minutes. While you may know a lot about this popular brand, there are probably a lot of things that you don’t know about the company. These four facts will give you a new perspective on Toyota, its past, and its future.

Toyota Employs Many Americans

Toyota is a Japanese company, but it employs nearly 350,000 people in the United States. In fact, the Camry, assembled at plants in Indiana and Kentucky, may be the most American car you can buy. In addition to employing Americans, Toyota primarily uses parts manufactured within the U.S.

The next time someone talks about buying an American car, you can feel confident saying that Toyota vehicles sold in the U.S. have very strong ties to the economy and workforce.

The Company is Owned by the Toyoda Family

Toyota is owned by the Toyoda family (which means “fertile rice paddies” in Japanese). When the family founded its vehicle manufacturing company in 1937, Risaburo Toyoda discovered that he could write “Toyota” in eight brush strokes, which was fortunate, because eight is considered to be a lucky number in Japanese culture. (Risaburo had married into the Toyoda family, so he may not have felt a great attachment to the name.) The other family members agreed to use Toyota because it gave the company a better brand.

Toyota Owns Lexus and Scion

Toyota understands that it needs to brand its cars well to attract buyers. The Toyota name stands for quality at an affordable price; however, to branch into luxury and entry-level markets, Toyota developed the Lexus and Scion brands.

The Lexus division of Toyota focuses on making luxury vehicles. They tend to have higher prices and more features than the Camry.

Toyota started the Scion brand to attract younger buyers looking for entry-level vehicles. The vehicles are made from quality parts, but they don’t come with many extras. This approach helps keep the cost of Scion vehicles low.

Toyota Invests Heavily in New Fuel Technologies

Toyota has always tried to make cars more efficient. Even in the 1930s, Toyota led the way in manufacturing technology. Today, the company invests heavily in new fuel technologies.

The Prius is one of the most popular hybrid vehicles in the world. Without Toyota’s research and development, it’s unlikely that people would have access to such affordable hybrid technology.

More recently, Toyota developed the Mirai car, which runs on hydrogen. Hydrogen fuel offers several benefits for drivers. The Mirai can travel about 300 miles on a full tank. It only takes about five minutes to refill the tank. Toyota even includes fuel throughout the first three years of ownership.

Toyota has been in business for nearly 80 years, but there’s much that consumers don’t know about the company. That’s too bad because Toyota is an interesting, innovative business that keeps changing the way people travel.

Image by qimono, used under CCO 1.0

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