Is Lexus imploding?
 

What in the hell is happening to Lexus? The IS300 is virtually nonexistent for the past year. Ditto with the GS and LS. The RX was selling like crazy about a year ago but it seems things have slowed down judging by the numbers on the road in southern California. Is this true for the RX?

Personally, I am happy to see Lexus go to shits as it shows Toyota's arrogance and complacency while the rest of the manufacturers glutted the market with exciting, new cars. Seems like Toyota really got caught with its guard down.

Umm no?

Are you sure? Which of their cars are selling? I know Lexus was never intended for super high volumes. So if they are doing fine, one or two models have to be selling moderately well. I'm thinking the LS is doing about the same as before. But with the IS doing just about NOTHING, is the RX still doing as well as when it first came out?

Any sales numbers over the past year?

I haven't seen any sales figures to know if Lexus is slipping. I'll agree that I see far fewer RX330s than I might have expected to given the huge number of RX300s around. The IS300 was a rare swing-and-a-miss for Lexus and they know it. The replacement is coming.

This does bring up an interesting question, my apologies if it's been answered before. Is there a site somewhere that shows automotible industry sales figures? I've looked for and been unable to find something like that. It would be very interesting for these kinds of discussions.

Even if Lexus hasn't self-destructed, they SEVERELY underestimated the effect from all the new competition on the IS300. The evidence is that Lexus barely improved the damn car for 2004 and NO ONE is buying it in southern California for the last year. The IS300 was all over the road in 2003.

It is supposed to be their volume seller. It's a big oversight for Lexus's arrogance.

But true, I've never seen a carmaker that can make changes or add new cars to the market faster than Toyota. I'm not saying they're down and out. I'm just saying it seems like Lexus is down...for now.

I vote for near extinction, then management overthrow followed by some redemption, like Cadillac. Toyota, aka Lexus only has any 'edge' showing in its aka Scion division, and that's about it, and it's not really alot. It's sad seeing as how they have such an automotive history and lots of resources, but they can't produce one sport(y) car!

Don't know how accurate this site is but I'd say Lexus appears to be doing fine.

There's also this article which says this: In 2003, Toyota sold 259,755 Lexus vehicles in the United States, up 11 percent from a year earlier, and more than BMW, Mercedes, Cadillac or Acura.

It was the fourth straight year Lexus has been the nation’s No. 1-selling luxury nameplate -- a remarkable feat, considering the franchise isn’t yet 15 years old.

Where are you getting your information from? Just observation?

Nice find. But I know Lexus did great in 2003 with the IS300 selling hot and the introduction of the RX.

I'm wondering about 2004.

Yeah, I'm going by observation on the road in southern California (OC and LA areas).

Interesting. I hadn't really noticed a decline in Lexuses. I think I did hear that the IS was cooling down in sales though. But they sure did sell a crapload of those. I actually considered getting one when I went looking for a new car. I loved the chronograph style dash. It was too expensive though.

I hear Lexus is updating the IS though so I wouldn't be surprised if that started selling like crazy. Someone I know said she'll probably get one. You maybe right though. I know I see a LOT of Lexuses here in SoCal but I'm not sure if they're 2004 models. I think they might mostly be older ones.

In 2003, I saw IS300's all over the place and I MEAN all over.

In 2004, they have virtually DISAPPEARED from the streets. I see more TSX's than IS's. The occurrence of an IS on the road is SO rare now that I see about as many RX8's as I do IS's. I'm serious.

Your basing a company's sales off of how many you see on the road is pointless. If you saw IS300's all over the road in the 2003 what is different in 2004? Wouldn't all those same IS300's be out on the road?

Same as the assumption that since there are so many RX-8s on dealership lots that they aren't selling, when the RX-8 has been meeting or exceeding Mazda's sales goals in every market.

Basing information off of what you see "on the road" or "at a dealership" is about as accurate as saying there are less fish in the ocean the whole ocean this year because you caught less then than you did the year before when you went fishing

Sorry to say, but both Toyota and Lexus are doing just fine worldwide.

The US market is important, but the US is bigger than CA.

I'm thinking the same thing. Wouldn't they still be out on the road? But they are not.

Southern California can be quite a microcosm of the behavior of the car market. Of course you have to be careful in making inferences by observing what's going on out in the streets. And I have. I've done this quite succesfully in the past with the car market as well as other markets. The "switch" with the IS in southern California is SO GLARING that I can not pass it up.

Ok buddy...

I see what you and Icemastr are saying. But anyone got the sales numbers on the IS300 across 2003 AND 2004?

Additionally, if you survey the Lexus line-up, every car aside from the RX has been out for a long time and is due for a new model. Again, no one can bring changes about and new models out faster than Toyota can, but isn't this looking a little similar to the sad state of Acura just 2 years ago? Of course it's not as bad as Acura was a few years ago and all Lexus has to do is bring out a new, higher performance IS and watch sales skyrocket along with continuing RX sales.

I just wanted to note that I've never seen Lexus in such a position before. That is, if my observations mirror reality. But I want to see the official numbers.

Don't call me buddy, buddy. :)

Hey, after all this talk, I completely forgot about the Lexus ES. Talk about a "forgotten" car. That ES never quite caught on and is a second disappointment for Lexus along with the IS's current demise. What a complete embarrassment in the face of the BMW 3-series and Mercedes C-class among others. Even the Acura TSX has been able to sell in the current glutted market.

Yeah, yeah, I know, we need to see the official numbers because I might be dreaming because I'm generalizing from observations made on a remote island. Yeah yeah.

Fine by me if Lexus chokes... I find their product line boring. Same for Toyota i suppose...

Semi-off topic, but we have this guy at my office driving a silver GS... he always double parks it (close to the building mind you) and thinks it is God's gift to the automotive world. What a prick. He gets nowhere near the attention (which crushes him) from co-workers about his car that my 8 seems to attract... but that's not why I got my car. (even more crushing to him)

Sorry. He doesn't help my feeling that Lexus is lame. Just my opinion of course.

Maybe this will help ... 2003 sales vs 2004 sales for Nov and YTD

http://www.prowleronline.com/scrapbo...12-4-lexus.jpg

First of all if we're talking about this on a Mazda RX8 board then I think it should be said that there might be some bias against cars with sloppy suspensions. On the other hand Lexuses ride quite well many other people's point of view. Different strokes.

i agree about the current lexus models though. I really liked the GS when it first came out, it just made sense as competitively priced sportish sedan. But the styling was controversial and grew old. The first gen LS400's I still think are great, the 2nd gen's are pretty good too. The third gen's I think are where we see where Lexus went. The visual design just sucks, of all the cars. Nothing really inspiring. I dont think it ever was though. But the interior and running gear of the LS430 is top notch, and has pretty good gimmicks compared to the competition, and for the price. thats the way its always been, the competition has just gotten a lot better.

I think that's how it is with all of their cars. Lexus seems either to intentionally design for engineering rather than looks, or are fundamentally mistaken in how people think about how the cars look. The SC is their best looking car, but they basically studed yachts and other high dollar equipment and grafted lines. And there's still somethign odd about it. Half of this is IMO.

If anything I think Lexus will probably stake their claim in the next several years by bringing hybrid luxury to market first.

Thanks, WHealy.

So the IS300 sales is declining. But what about the RX? Your list doesn't have the RX numbers. Seems like overall Lexus sales (minus the RX) has even gone up a little because declines in all the other models are being offset by gains in ES and LS sales, even though in absolute terms the gains aren't that big but neither are the losses.

Well said, Zaku8.

I especially loved your comment about studying yachts as it is so true. Where the styling of the SC came from is an enigma.

I don't know what to say. I'd rather see HOnda, especially Acura sales slip badly. Honda can't seem to make a damn thing that I could even remotely consider! I mean really... the luxury car market is RWD or AWD... NOT FWD. VTEC? It was innovative and cool when it first came out. Now? Who doesn't have variable-valve timing?

Frankly, I've always found Lexus cars and Toyota's in general to be boring cars. The vast majority of them are rather expensive and underpowered... not the combo to draw enthuiasts. It would be interesting to see what the effects are of a significant drop in sales across the board...

Actually you can for fishing. There is quite a bit of science to fishing. At X time of year Y fish is in season. That occurs because of weather and breeding habits of said fish. For the area that you go fishing for said fish, if your catch and your observations of other people's catches seem to be pretty off from the norm, it's fair to infer that there is some problem with the fish population. Reasons for that can be varied, but the fact that that catches are lower than normal usually point to a change in the fish population.

Toyota (and Honda) are both getting arrogant... much like the American car companies were back in the '70s. This was really apparent when we were car shopping last year for both my wife's new car (we got her a Mazda 6S) and my RX-8. Both Honda and Toyota were like "so what? We don't care if you buy from us" and their offerings were at best, bland. Watch, they're both going to lose market share in the coming years.