zerinVR6
06-22-2005, 08:24 AM
June 20 (Bloomberg) -- Toyota Motor Corp.'s Scion raised its 2005 U.S. sales forecast to 140,000 vehicles as the two-year-old brand, added to attract younger buyers, accounts for a majority of the automaker's growth.
Sales through May more than doubled from a year earlier to 62,003 and are on pace to reach almost 150,000 for the year. Mark Templin, manager of the brand, said production capacity will hold down the annual growth. Scion in January forecast annual sales of at least 120,000.
``Unless something changes between now and the end of the year we will not have the production to be able to sell 150,000 cars,'' Templin, 44, said in a phone interview today from Toyota's U.S. sales base in Torrance, California. ``We think that we have the potential to do around 140,000.''
Scion at that level would rise 41 percent from last year's 99,259. Its growth this year through May accounted for just over half of Toyota's 10 percent increase in U.S. sales. Toyota, Japan's largest automaker and No. 4 in the U.S., added the brand in 2003 in California and expanded it nationally last year.
Scion sells the xA hatchback, xB wagon and tC coupe. Base prices for the three models range from $13,045 to $17,515, thousands of dollars below the current average transaction price for a new vehicle of $24,520, according to Bandon, Oregon-based CNW Marketing Research.
Consumers are buying Scion vehicles with between $700 and $1,000 in accessories, Templin said. Because Toyota offers essentially no cash or financing incentives, Scion is already profitable, he said without elaborating.
The Toyota City, Japan-based company's U.S. shares dropped 81 cents to $72.01 in New York Stock Exchange composite trading at 4:17 p.m. They have fallen 12 percent this year.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/...=asia (http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000080&sid=aCVrdnGQ46Pg&refer=asia)
Sales through May more than doubled from a year earlier to 62,003 and are on pace to reach almost 150,000 for the year. Mark Templin, manager of the brand, said production capacity will hold down the annual growth. Scion in January forecast annual sales of at least 120,000.
``Unless something changes between now and the end of the year we will not have the production to be able to sell 150,000 cars,'' Templin, 44, said in a phone interview today from Toyota's U.S. sales base in Torrance, California. ``We think that we have the potential to do around 140,000.''
Scion at that level would rise 41 percent from last year's 99,259. Its growth this year through May accounted for just over half of Toyota's 10 percent increase in U.S. sales. Toyota, Japan's largest automaker and No. 4 in the U.S., added the brand in 2003 in California and expanded it nationally last year.
Scion sells the xA hatchback, xB wagon and tC coupe. Base prices for the three models range from $13,045 to $17,515, thousands of dollars below the current average transaction price for a new vehicle of $24,520, according to Bandon, Oregon-based CNW Marketing Research.
Consumers are buying Scion vehicles with between $700 and $1,000 in accessories, Templin said. Because Toyota offers essentially no cash or financing incentives, Scion is already profitable, he said without elaborating.
The Toyota City, Japan-based company's U.S. shares dropped 81 cents to $72.01 in New York Stock Exchange composite trading at 4:17 p.m. They have fallen 12 percent this year.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/...=asia (http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000080&sid=aCVrdnGQ46Pg&refer=asia)