Cambridge Now!

 

Sean Beaton, sales manager at Cambridge Toyota says the recall is proceeding in a progressive, timely manner and they will commence deliveries of new vehicles with a replaced gas pedal On Friday February 5th. All dealers are receiving shipments of the replacement parts, at this time it is in limited numbers.

 

I wasn't the only person in the showroom when I dropped in today to chat with Beaton, which is a good indication that die-hard Toyota customers understand that sometimes parts are defective.

 

The stop production and sales order issued by the world's largest auto manufacturer sent a clear message to the public that they do not take customer safety lightly.

"It had to be done," said Chris Vickery, sales and leasing consultant at Cambridge Toyota.

"All test drive vehicles had the pedal issue fixed right away. Yes, It's a little slower in here this week but we expected that...but soon it will be fixed and it will be behind us. It was the right thing to do," said Vickery.

 

One auto industry analyst sees Detroit's response to Toyota's misstep as undignified, self-serving and overblown. As if to say that a Chrysler Sebring is suddenly comparable to a Toyota Camry.

 

But there are other business professionals that are comparing Toyota's willingness to make it right, with Tylenol's quick response to their bottle cap security issue. They addressed the issue, publicly apologized and the entire industry benefited from the ordeal and the safety innovations which came about as a result of the recall.

 

GM jumped on the recall offering Toyota owners sweet deals to trade in their Toyota's in for a General Motors product. Gee, has anyone stopped to consider or compare re-sale value between the big three and Toyota. Three decades of virtually untarnished reputation is not going be wiped out over night by a gas pedal recall.

 

Perhaps it's a whole lot of wishful thinking when you consider that 19 alleged deaths to the recall are spread out over 20 million vehicles sold in North America in the past 10 years. Less than one death per million vehicles (clearly a terrible thing for the families of the deceased) but by comparison the Ford Explorer equipped with defective Firestone Tires claimed 250 lives. That's one model --one incident.

 

When it's all said and done it is estimated that the recall could cost Toyota $2-billion.