Is One Japanese Camry Worth 2.5 Made in the US? - Wall Street Journal (blog)

Toyota Motor Corp. Toyota’s hybrid Camry that went on sale in Japan on Sept. 5. Toyota Motor Corp.The 2012 Toyota Camry.

Two weeks after Toyota Motor Corp. took the wraps off its latest generation Camry sedan with a slickly produced, Hollywood-style debut in the U.S. on Aug. 23 (at Paramount Studios, no less), the company quietly rolled out the domestic version of the sedan on Monday.

With nary a back flip, live band or pulsing LED billboard to celebrate its arrival, the Japan-market 2012 Camry rolls into showrooms touting such class-leading features as “trunk capacity to allow accommodation of up to four golf bags,” according to the official press release.

In Japan, the Camry is available only as a hybrid, unlike its U.S. market cousin that offers both standard (with a four-cylinder or V6 engine) and gas-electric hybrid options. The U.S. and Japanese cars share platforms, but while the hybrid versions look similar—the Japan hybrid has a slightly more prominent hood and linear front grill—the standard U.S. Camry and Japan market car are like night and day in paternity-test provoking ways.

Take price, for example.

While the standard U.S. market Camry manufacturers’ suggested retail price ranges from $21,955 to $29,845, the Japanese Camry MSRP starts at 3.04 million yen ($40,000) and tops out at a whopping 3.80 million yen ($50,000) using an exchange rate of 76 yen to the dollar. In other words, for the price of one “Leather package” Camry sold in Japan, you could buy nearly 2.5 of the bare-bones L grade Camry models sold in the U.S.

OK, part of that differential is due to an apples-and-oranges comparison between the gas-engine U.S. Camry and the Japan-market hybrid. But even when both nations’ hybrid versions are compared, the price gap is substantial. Toyota is asking $25,900 for the U.S. market 2012 Hybrid LE and $27,400 for the Hybrid XLE—about half the MSRP of the priciest Japanese hybrid Camry.

Why the huge disparity? “It’s mostly a function of the yen’s strength against the dollar and also lower production volumes in Japan,” explained Keiichi Yoneda, Toyota’s deputy chief engineer for the Camry, who spoke to reporters at a low-key press conference in Tokyo.

The Japanese currency has raced to record highs against the dollar this year, which makes cars and other “Made In Japan” products more expensive when sold overseas. That has prompted Toyota and other Japanese car makers to shift production offshore.

In fact, Toyota says none of its newest Camry models—the seventh generation of the line—will be exported from Japan to North America (3,200 were exported in 2010.) At the same time, Toyota expects to sell only 500 to 1,000 Camry models a month in Japan, which accounted for less than 1% of the car’s global sales of 692,000 vehicles last year.

That stands in stark contrast to the U.S., which accounts for 52% of the global market for Camry models. Higher volumes at its Camry factory in Georgetown, Kentucky, allows Toyota to spread out fixed costs over more cars, thereby reducing the average price per vehicle.

To keep that factory humming, Toyota will back the U.S. Camry’s launch with the largest marketing campaign in the model’s history, including some 40 new commercials.

But in Japan, the car is getting less fanfare. According to Toyota’s press kit, the company’s biggest marketing gambit is a cable television documentary about the 2012 year model hosted by a middle-aged former Japanese pro baseball player and coach. It airs at 11:30 pm.

Yawn.

Follow Chester Dawson on Twitter @DeliverTheFirm

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