Toyota says “silent majority” don’t want EVs yet, for one key reason

A senior Toyota executive has reaffirmed that a “quiet majority” of Australians enact no longer desire EVs at this stage.

Speaking with Chasing Autos, Toyota Australia vice president of sales and advertising and marketing Sean Hanley said those clients require a assorted combination of lengthy vary, heavy towing functionality and lifelike pricing: a proposition no EV in the interim satisfies, the emblem says.

“Should always you perceive at the procedure in which of dwelling that Australians revel in, we would squawk there is a gigantic market [of people for whom EVs are not suitable],” said Toyota Australia vice president of sales and advertising and marketing Sean Hanley.

Talking to Chasing Autos at the 2023 Japan mobility tell – where Toyota unveiled 5 unique battery-electrical items, plus an inexpensive, combustion-powered ute – Hanley equipped examples of demographics for whom EVs don’t but work.

Toyota fears alienating majority if shift to EVs is simply too lickety-split

“Electrification is section of our approach, but no longer all of it. Why? Because if you happen to streak to all of that currently, you’re going to surely alienate a huge amount of the market in Australia because [electrification] can’t enact what they wish it to enact.

“Look at the mining and agriculture industries, perceive at who we respectfully know as the ‘gray nomads’,” Hanley said, referring to retirees who tow caravans lengthy-distance, most steadily with a Toyota Land Cruiser four-wheel force.

“Possess a perceive at Land Cruiser sales. Possess a perceive at Hilux sales. Possess a perceive at Prado sales, and all [Toyota] SUVs,” said Hanley.

“There would possibly be a quiet majority of Australians, who aren’t necessarily talking, who require these vehicles.

To this point in 2023, Toyota has delivered 44,301 Hilux utes and 19,071 Land Cruiser four-wheel drives in Australia. That compares to 23,457 deliveries of the Tesla Model Y – the country’s easiest-selling EV mannequin, a midsize SUV.

Neither the Land Cruiser nor the Hilux has an electrified variant. Nevertheless, Toyota will open hybrid versions of every and each the Hilux ute and the Land Cruiser by a purpose date of 2030.

Extra, Toyota veteran this week’s Tokyo motor tell to direct theory versions of a fully-electrical Land Cruiser SE and the EPU electrical pick-up, each and each of which are high on Toyota Australia’s agenda to sell locally.

If the electrical versions reached production, they could be bought alongside combustion-hybrid Land Cruiser and Hilux items concurrently, offering clients assorted ranges of functionality, comfort, vary and towing.

“Still majority” own heavy-duty requirements, no longer lower than most steadily

“While electrification is accelerating, there remains to be a gigantic market of of us who enact need 700-800 kilometres of vary, who enact are looking out for to tow 3.5 tonnes, and who don’t are looking out for to alarm whether or not they’ll earn dwelling because there is not any longer any such thing as a charging space – or no automobile that is affordable for them.

“It’s no longer that they don’t desire one, but what EV is on hand for them? I don’t know where that automobile is. I’m no longer talking a pair of BEV that can enact 100km whereas towing 3.5 tonnes.

“I’m talking a pair of BEV that can enact 700 to 800km whereas towing, and recharge in 5 minutes.

“When you will take care of an EV that’s going to enact 3.5 tonne towing for 700km, I’ll repeat you now, when it does advance, it gained’t be cheap as a result of the huge battery and the weight.

“Which capacity it is mighty extra worthy to impact business vehicles than it is to impact a passenger SUV,” Hanley said.

Except the car exchange delivers a viable EV option with lengthy vary, high towing functionality and cheap pricing, Hanley foresees that Australians will reduction their contemporary vehicles for longer.

“Where are they going to streak? All they could enact is reduction [the car] they own got forever. And it’d be a surely, very game executive that can begin taxing [existing car ownership],” Hanley said.