As was mentioned in a recent article, Toyota will be manufacturing the RAV4 at a brand new facility in
Woodstock, Ontario (see automotive news archive
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| Alongside the RAV4 will be another redesigned model, the Yaris, due to replace the ECHO Hatchback next year. (Photo: Toyota Canada) |
July 19, 2005: Toyota to Build New RAV4 Plant in Woodstock, Ontario). Currently, production of all RAV4s takes place in Japan. Feeding the insatiable North American appetite for SUVs, the now the more and more popular market for smaller, fuel-efficient models will be divested to the Ontario plant once it is up and running sometime in 2008.
And now back to Frankfurt: alongside the RAV4 will be another redesigned model, the Yaris, due to replace the ECHO, possibly because the capitalization of ECHO did not resonate in the market as well as Toyota thought it would but more likely because Toyota can market a global name easier than one that is now only available
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| The Echo Hatchback is a regular top-10 seller in Canada, the only jurisdiction to get a Yaris in North America. (Photo: Alexandra Straub, Canadian Auto Press) |
in Canada. However, it's hardly a surprise that ECHO sedan sales in the United States suffered as they did after Toyota released the fashionable Scion line amongst much fanfare and an aggressive marketing campaign. Then again, there really wasn't much to market for the ECHO aside from it's, ahem, cavernous interior and of course, fuel efficiency. Needless to say, it's now a dead issue, literally, south of the 49th.
In Canada, where no Scion xA, xB or tC is available, we can pretty well guess what to expect from the next generation Yaris. After all, our streets are crawling with the cuddly little ECHO Hatchbacks (the name stamped on Canadian market Yarises), and with good reason. Few other automakers offer a package as tidy, efficient and appealing as the ECHO Hatch, and none with Toyota's vaunted reputation for reliability. So with gas prices solidly into dollar-per-litre territory (and approaching $3 USD per gallon for Yanks, and Rebs if any remain), it only makes sense that more and more people will try to beat the pump prices by buying cars that use less gasoline (people in Texas excluded, because in Texas, as we all know, everything has to be bigger).
