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Toyota to hike prices of Innova, Corolla Altis- Automobiles-Auto-News By Industry-News-The Economic Times

BANGALORE: Automobile manufacturer Toyota Kirloskar Motor will increase the prices of its key models, Innova (in the range of Rs 10,000-25,000) and
Corolla Altis (Rs 16,000-25,000) from January 1.
TKM Deputy Managing Director (Marketing) Sandeep Singh, said: "Due to circumstances beyond our control, such as the increase in the rupee, dollar exchange rate by 20 per cent in the last three months, we have been forced to increase the price of our vehicles."
However, TKM has tried to absorb the price increase as much as possible, limiting the increase to the customer, he said.
Though TKM had reduced the prices of its products following the four per cent excise duty cut by the government, the current increase is inevitable, the company said.
Singh indicated that TKM would be actively promoting the Corolla Altis and Innova and able to maintain its market share for both the models in 2009

Most of the time Toyota are the first to hike prices at slightest of instence. The price reduction due to Govt. cutting 4% taxes is going to go waste. In the season of slow sales & huge discounts, this move is not going to help.
I hope Toyota goes down like the other 3, with these type of customer unfriendly policies!

Unlike the big three, Toyota make vehicles the market wants. They aren't going to "go down".

Actively promoting by giving big discounts?

ImmortalZ; the vehicle the market want? Where is the diesel engine? Where is the Fortuner? Oh by the way, heard its coming with 3.2L.

Many companies that make cars with a high import content are singing the same tune - quoting falling INR strength. Even Maruti dealers are suggesting (ads in today's TOI, Bangalore) that there would be a price increase in January. I wonder what Maruti's excuse is.

I'm not sure how they hope to sell more cars after a price increase if people aren't purchasing enough cars with all the offers going around.

Customers need to understand the auto industry is in the middle of a slowdown - the dealers can't dictate terms beyond a point. And so are other industries like IT - where many of the customers came from. Car dealers will see very few company leased cars over the next year or so.

Take your time - don't get fooled by these threats of price hikes. Now is the time to do some hard bargaining. If they do hike prices, fewer people are going to buy their cars and eventually they have to bring down prices. During a slowdown every manufacturer has to come up with his own method of keeping prices low.

I think this is a trick to push of stock before 31st! Otherwise why keep Jan. 1 deadline, bad played Toyota, consumers can read cheap plays now!

All the best to TKM. After seeing the sales figures in Nov, which plummeted by more than one-tenth in two months (3424 in Sep to 302 in Nov), and in the process falling behind the nearly 3 year old Civic, this will be akin to suicide.

I also hear some Initial Quality issues about Altis from some owners, though they don't seem serious at the moment.

He is talking about the international context, which is true to a certain extent. Toyota had many good products in its portfolio in US in tunes with the desires of customers, whereas GM only were banking on their SUVs. We all know how that turned out.

Having said that, in Indian context, Toyota is absolutely hopeless imo riding only on 2 models and 1 CBU.

Any details on those initial quality issues? I know of the squealing brakes but not of any other.

There is a suspension recall.

Don't understand why Toyota has grossly undermined the huge car market in India?
Do they still think India is a developing country & not many can afford cars?

Wish they had taken some cues from their Japanese counterpart (Suzuki).

Anything else apart from the suspension recall due to the squeal under braking.

Toyota also has plans to introduce the CNG version of the Innova in January 2009. I think the CNG version would bring some excitement to the company's sales.

That is quiet true. Also, Toyota feels that it cant afford a loss. Unlike Honda, toyota isnt selling that good. Honda is in a very good financial position compared to the others.

Honda and Toyota seem to have been only too happy about the luxury tag they got in India. They rightly deserve a premium for making quality products, but should not take the luxury tag seriously.

If they want to sell more cars in India they need some less expensive models in their line-up. They need more localization to achieve this. Finding vendors who can meet their quality norms at a low price might take time. But, haven't they been selling cars in India for over a decade now?

Either they were too picky or just didn't want to move away from their trusted vendors abroad - which won't be too surprising if one has worked with Japanese customers.

Neither company seems to be making losses in their India operations. IMO, they are probably trying to hold on to their high profit margins which is a dumb thing to do during a slowdown.