Toyota Announces End Of Scion Line, Absorbing Back Into Parent Brand

Toyota says it is killing its Scion brand of cars.

Speaking at a Spring 2015 launch, Scion’s former Vice President Doug Murtha explained the marketing strategy behind the launch of Scion brand and said that the brand aimed at young, energetic and urban buyers who wanted to differentiate themselves from their elders, in this case parents. Half of the 1 million Scions sold were bought by people under 35, Carter said, and 70 percent of those buyers were new to the Toyota family.

“I was there when we established Scion and our goal was to make Toyota stronger by learning how to better attract and engage young customers”, Lentz said.

In its first few years, Scion attracted solid sales with cars like the boxy xB and compact xA, but the brand – even with a recent infusion of newer vehicles – has not been able to really find its original niche. “Today’s younger buyers still want fun-to drive vehicles that look good, but they are also more practical”.

The FR-S, iA, and iM will all be sold as Toyotas, with the transition set to begin in August. However, the tC will be axed after the release of its final version in August of this year. The C-HR, which recently debuted at the Los Angeles Auto Show, will move to Toyota. Scion owners will continue to receive those services from Toyota dealerships and service centers. Scion sales in Canada and the USA peaked at 173,034 vehicles in 2006, but have fallen back since then. Still, sales only hit 56,167. Toyota says it will work closely with them to deal with the change. It seemed Scion never quite lived up to its full potential as a brand for the kids, and that’s kind of a shame. Scion regional representatives will assume different responsibilities in their respective Toyota sales offices. While its products were very closely related to Toyota vehicles they had a unique, slightly chunky, style, created to be easily customizable. The subcompact Scion iA that’s sold in the U.S.is already sold as a Toyota in Canada – the Yaris Sedan. Scion’s best-seller, the tC coupe, starts at $21,330, or $2,600 more than a Honda Civic.

“In the end, Scion just had fuel economy and price, and those just didn’t stand up as competitive differentiators anymore, especially with plunging gasoline prices leaving dealers with huge inventories of fuel-sippers across the market”.