Learn from Toyota…the good and the bad

By John Westerveld
From the blog: http://www.21stcenturysupplychain.com

I’ve been thinking about this post for some time. I’m a Toyota customer. Our family has owned four Toyota Corolla’s over the past twenty years and we’ve always been very happy with them. Our most recent purchase, a 2010 Corolla S, has been a great car for my daily 160 Km (100 mile) commute. With a fuel mileage of 5.6 litres per 100 km (35 mpg) on the highway, I’m not cursing the oil companies with the vehemence I once did. On the other hand, this is the first time I can recall in all the years that we’ve owned Toyotas that I’ve had to deal with a recall. And so far, I’ve had two (brakes, accelerator pedal)…with a possible third (power steering?) rumoured to be in the works.
The Toyota quality problems have disappointed me. I learned about the Toyota production system when I was studying Industrial Engineering in college. At that time, it was held up as the future in manufacturing - a model that other manufacturers around the world should follow. It still is. At Toyota, defects are ... Read the rest of the article and comment on the blog here: http://blog.kinaxis.com/2010/02/learn-from-toyota-the-good-and-the-...
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