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It's not affecting foreign automakers nearly as much for two reasons: The Japanese automakers have really worked hard to make their manufacturing lines (and ve
by crowdpleaser 8y ago
It's not affecting foreign automakers nearly as much for two reasons:
The Japanese automakers have really worked hard to make their manufacturing lines (and vehicle designs) modular (a line that makes Camrys on Monday can make RAV4s on Tuesday), the foreign automakers' sedan sales didn't slip nearly as badly as the domestic automakers did so a lot of their plants/lines are still profitable to operate, and the US has always been uniquely interested in trucks and SUVs so many of the foreign-owned plants here were already optimized for SUVs (e.g the BMW plant in America has made SUVs since its inception).
- jstanley 8y ago> a line that makes Camrys on Monday can make RAV4s on Tuesday In fact it is even more agile than this! I toured a Toyota factory in Japan last year and they were assembling many different models on the same line at the same time, with the same workers. From what I recall, it is supposed to improve morale as the work is less repetitive. I highly recommend the tour. It is free, and there is an English-language option. The only downside was it was quite a long train ride away from Tokyo, for quite a short tour.
- tanilama 8y agoWhy wouldnt American car manufacturers do the same? They don't have the technology?
- crowdpleaser 8y agoHistorically the American Cars and SUVs were different enough that it would be untenable to make them side by side. It's gotten better since the SUVs became more car-like, but they haven't invested in modularity like the Japanese automakers, sometimes the companies blame unions for the inflexibility, but I think that's a red herring. However, it may be the case that the unions make it expensive enough to build modular lines that it's just not worth pursuing.