Toyota’s Scion confirmed for Canada for 2010. Again.

One year after its first press release on this subject matter, Toyota Canada felt compelled last week to issue another statement about its so-called U.S.-only “youth brand”, Scion, effectively saying, yes, it will be coming to Canada. Really.

In the past twelve moths, the auto world has seen a few changes, n’est pas? So maybe some calming of the cynics was in order.

But the basics of last week’s release hasn’t changed much from the original October 19, 2008 presser.

Scions for sale initially will be the European Toyota Avensis-based tC coupe (left), subcompact xD (middle) and compact xB (right) wagons; store-within-Toyota-stores in Montréal, Toronto and Vancouver only; and no prices yet.

We now know, though, the launch month (September). A dealer list has been announced. And potentially optimistic sales figures have been thrown into mix just for fun.

Toyota says, that when the brand rolls out across Canada by 2013, it hopes to be selling 30,000 Scions annually here. Other models, like the Smart ForTwo-like iQ city car, may help the cause.

However, using the basic 10:1 ratio, with U.S. sales of 114,000 in 2008, I expect Scion to move more like 12,000 to 15,000 cars—max. We’ll see.

Do you think Toyota needs another brand in Canada to sell to young buyers?

Will Scions cannibalize sales from the existing small Toyotas like the Yaris and Matrix?

[Source: Toyota Canada]

Comments

[RP]

Dumb idea to have another brand. Looks like Toyota didn't learn anything from the GM experience. I suspect this brand will only suck sales from the Yaris, Matrix and Corolla. It will have plenty of competition beyond Toyota to deal with too.

They better redesign the tC coupe, the Kia Coupe is going to sell better. Why? The Kia is better looking and probably less expensive.

The xD is guaranteed to be cross-shopped with the Matrix, and given a similar size and price, I think the Matrix looks better.

While I can see the xB must have a lot of utility, it looks completely anonymous compared to the Kia Soul or the Nissan Cube. The other 2 have a funky look that would appeal to younger buyers.

I think Toyota would be better off just adding to its current lineup where it could generate sales without its models competing against each other instead of going through the time and expense of creating a whole new brand.

[John Smith]

John, did you pass basic math? Using 10:1 US:Canada ratio "broadly" works when comparing an entire product lineup. If you focus on small cars (the Canadian passion) that make up the Scion lineup and that number is considerably less than 10:1. Add in the iQ Fortwo-killer and 20-30k cars/year isn't such a stretch.

About the only thing you might have nailed right was how it will impact Yaris...and every other subcompact model in the industry.