OPINION: Toyota is overlooked as a brand for car people

It’s not the same for Toyota. Mention the Japanese brand and your association is more likely to be a dented, high mileage Prius earning its keep as an Uber. It’s not aspirational and it’s certainly not sporty. And it’s a little unfair for two reasons. Number one, that Prius probably has a quarter of a million hard miles under its belt and is still working hard. And secondly, Toyota does an awful lot to entertain people who like cars.

For one thing, there’s the current GR range. In an era when performance cars are fewer and farther between than they once were, Toyota’s persistence with relatively affordable drivers’ cars should be applauded. OK, the Supra takes some flak for being a reheated BMW Z4, but the GR86 and GR Yaris are both hugely entertaining steers that would make an Uber driver’s daily grind a lot more enjoyable. Need further evidence that Toyota is motivated by fun as well as the bottom line? How about the totally unnecessary four-wheel-drive GR86 built for SEMA.

There’s also a back catalogue of cars now available second-hand that are well worth seeking out. The original Supra allows you live out Fast and Furious fantasies, the Corolla T-Sport is the overlooked Honda VTEC alternative and the MR2 Roadster out-MX-5s the MX-5. And if you’re feeling particularly flush and have an empty space in your climate controlled garage there’s the quite wonderful 2000GT. And that rich seam of road-going sports cars is backed up by motorsport pedigree with Le Mans wins and World Rally Championships to Toyota’s name, among other activities. We’ll gloss over the so-so showing in Formula One and that time they cheated in the WRC for now.

Toyota has also done its bit to help out car makers we hold dear. In the 1990s, Porsche called them in on a consultancy basis to make their production processes more efficient. More than merely helping Stuttgart save a few deutsche marks in the process of assembling cars, there’s an argument to suggest Toyota saved the German firm from going under. 

Another sports car maker that has benefitted from Toyota is Lotus. The final iteration of the Excel borrowed from the contemporary Supra while the Elise was enlivened by the 2ZZ-GE engine to allow it to be sold in the United States when its Rover K-series forebear was banished on emissions grounds. The Japanese giant deserves credit for giving a leg-up to smaller sports cars makers. 

There’s also something to be said for Toyota’s steadfast resistance to commit to EVs in the way that many of its corporate rivals did. At the time, it looked as if it was being left behind, but the landscape is changing to make Toyota’s position look foresightful. The number of car makers scaling back and slowing down their transition to all-electric grows by the day; Toyota hasn’t backtracked because it never fully committed to turning its back on internal combustion. EVs are probably our destination, but there was an adroit disagreement on the correct speed to get there.

Whatever way you cut it, there’s a lot to like about Toyota and the way it does things. Maybe the reason Toyota is overlooked as an enthusiasts’ brand is because it does so much else. Quite a lot of its image is tied up in the aforementioned Prius, after all, which isn’t exactly the first port of call for a petrolhead. Then again, Ford has the Ecosport in its back catalogue and nobody cares about that when they’re bidding an old Cosworth into several figures. A global corporation like Toyota can’t exclusively cater to car enthusiasts, but when it does it proves it’s one of us.

Elise image courtesy Absolute Lotus magazine