I went on another tour of a Toyota City car factory today. (That makes a grand total of 6 visits!) And I realized that I never did a blog dedicated to cars in Japan! I have just a few pictures on the subject, but hopefully interesting nonetheless.
But first, here's a plant update for all of your Toyota-lovers out there!
I wish I could take pictures in these factories... not of the parts, process, or production line, but of all of the goofy Japanese signs.
For example, they have cartoon posters of what looks like Wii characters playing outside with their Toyotas. There is one for every season. In winter they are going skiing, in fall they are going camping and fishing, in summer they are doing some sightseeing on a car ferry, and in spring they are going for a drive through cherry blossom trees! Everything is so "cute" and just as you would expect in Japan!
The plant I went to today makes luxury vehicles sold in Japan, like Estima, MarkX, and Crown, and therefore, demand for these cars is really low right now. They have 4,500 employees making 80,000 vehicles per year! That's less than 300 vehicles per day. The takt time was incredibly high (and the line was moving really slowly).
In comparison, roughly the same number of employees used to crank out the big Tundra, Sequoia, & Sienna on two different lines at over 1,500 trucks per day back when I was working on-site at Toyota Indiana!!
It might be time for this Toyota plant to think about cutting back to only 1 shift! Of course, that would cause a major uproar with the Japanese government if layoffs were to occur, so I'm guessing the slow production line will continue instead.
I am also amazed at the vehicle colors I see on the production line. During the tour Toyota always stresses how they can make many colors on the same line, but I only ever see 3 colors: white, silver, and black. Tag says it's because middle-aged people prefer those colors, and that's who is buying these luxury cars. But I'm not convinced. It seems almost every car owner in Japan has one of these three colors.
Surprisingly, I did see one navy blue car on the line today!
Alright, now to the photos!!
The only "real" pick up truck I've ever seen in Japan! It's an imported (driver on the left) Tundra (and black), and way too big to park pretty much any where in Nagoya!
No need for parking lots. These cars (black and silver) can just park right in front of the door!
Go ahead and park that (white car) any where!
This is supposed to be a (silver) minivan, but it's more like the size of a shoebox. You can use the bicycle as a size reference, but I really should have been standing next to it, so you could have real perspective...
A mini (black) pick-up truck in Japan. Again, this thing is so tiny, but hard to tell in the pic. It's like seeing a matchbox car rolling around the streets.
Toyota has Plug-in Prius stations all around Toyota City, and I think this car might be light blue, rather than the ubiquitous silver!!
This Toyota is actual mini-van sized, and I love that it's called "NOAH".
And it's the dark blue color I see very rarely!
