Lexus (Lexus) is a subsidiary acquired by Toyota.

Toyota had not produced luxury cars before acquiring Lexus. It is said that Lexus was Toyota’s first luxury car

The origin of Lexus

In August 1983, Toyota The car company held a momentous board meeting. It's the starting point for Lexus cars. This time, the board of directors used some innocuous discussion topics to hide Toyota's ambitions from the outside world. When the media and the public thought that this was another routine meeting for Toyota to summarize, express its stance and make inspiring remarks, the door of the conference room was suddenly closed because They are going to start the real and top-secret topic of this board meeting.

This topic revolves around the letter F (F is the F1 plan, F also alludes to the English word Flagship, and 1 alludes to the first car). The atmosphere of the meeting was no longer as calm and silent as before, and there were rare arguments on the board of directors. It's a make-or-break project for Toyota. Chairman of the Board of Directors Eiji Toyoda raised a question to the company's senior executives, designers, engineers and corporate strategy research experts: Can we create a luxury car to challenge the top market? Unexpectedly, everyone's answer was It’s the same – “yes”.

The word "can" is full of doubts and worries. But Toyota must make this gamble. Toyota Motor's development needs another breakthrough in 1983, just like the two times in World War II and the 1950s. In fact, except for Eiji Toyoda, no one agreed with the clarion call to enter the luxury car market from the beginning.

Shogichiro Toyoda, the son of the founder of Toyota and later succeeded Eiji Toyoda as chairman of the board and president, was hesitant. He believes Toyota should make what they do best better - make affordable cars for everyone. But Toyoda, like others who expressed approval but were worried, eventually changed his tune. "You push this question to me, why do we still need to invest billions of dollars and tens of thousands of hours of research and design to produce a new high-end car when Toyota has been successful in the United States for 30 years? Maybe, you know "I don't like riding in other people's high-end cars," Shoichiro Toyoda joked to a U.S. dealer shortly after Lexus was launched in the U.S.: "From now on, I don't have to be forced to ride in a Cadillac or a Lincoln or a Mercedes-Benz."

Eiji Toyoda was also very aware of Toyota's situation at that time. He did not want to board Noah's Ark for a futile ideological journey. He believes that once Toyota enters the luxury car market, it must fight against the top rivals in this field. Toyota will face the Mercedes-Benz S-Class and compete with BMW's top-of-the-line 7 Series sedan. If Toyota downgrades its status, investment risks will increase exponentially. To produce top-notch luxury cars, Toyota must invest heavily in developing new engines and chassis. However, the consumer demand orientation of the luxury car market is too unfamiliar to Toyota. Even if Toyota gets everything under the hood perfect, it still needs to consider ride comfort, interior and exterior aesthetics - none of which are Toyota's strengths.

What embarrasses Toyota most is Lexus’s reputation.

Toyota has never sold luxury cars. Can you imagine how difficult it would be to persuade consumers to buy a luxury car from the same company as a cheap Corolla (the entry-level car in the U.S. market) that costs tens of thousands of dollars? Toyota's position in the luxury car market Major rivals can sell cars just by relying on their brand name. Because it's called Mercedes-Benz, so I buy it; because it's called BMW, so I like it. However, will consumers be willing to pay close to the price of a Mercedes-Benz S-Class to buy a Toyota car, or even buy a car produced by Toyota but not called Toyota? This is indeed a serious problem.

"Toyota produces Lexus? Toyota is a base for producing tens of millions of cars, and Lexus is incompatible with it. This approach is like selling Wellington steaks in a McDonald's store." This was Fortune magazine at the time A dig at Toyota Motor Corporation, but they do have a point.

Toyota’s research found that the market is changing quietly.

The Babyboomers in the United States (the group of people born in the late 1940s to the early 1950s are called Babyboomers, which in Chinese means babies born during the baby boom. Compared with their war-torn parents, they (with obviously different values) are growing up. They will soon enter their senior years, and their spending power will also increase significantly. When they were young, they were loyal Toyota consumers, but now they want to buy higher-end cars.

Toyota senses opportunities in the luxury car market. At that time, luxury car manufacturing brands were becoming stronger, happier and more confident. Because they ushered in a new generation of luxury consumers. Eiji Toyoda's "ambition" is huge. He is unwilling to let go of every growing market, and the order to enter the luxury car market was subsequently issued. Six years and $500 million in investment, Lexus was born.

When Lexus went on the market in 1989, they had two models that had not been tested by the market, the flagship LS and the entry-level sedan ES. They sold 16,302 units that year. Two years later, they became the best-selling imported luxury brand in the United States and launched their third model, the SC Gube.

In 2000, Lexus usurped Cadillac's throne as North America's best-selling luxury car. From that year on, Lexus never left this position.

In 2003, Lexus sales reached 259,000 units and had 8 different models, 3 of which were sports luxury cars. There are currently approximately 1.3 million Lexus L-badged vehicles on U.S. roads.

However, Lexus can only be said to have achieved initial success in the United States, but in Europe where luxury cars are gathered, it is still difficult to get recognition from wealthy people. Lexus' road to Europe still has a long way to go.

The origin of the Lexus name and logo

In October 1986, senior executives of Toyota's U.S. sales company and luxury car R&D department held a meeting to discuss the naming of new models. Finding a suitable name was a hot potato. It must be elegant but not feminine; it must be noble but not squeamish; it must be generous but not unscrupulous. It must be unique and outstanding.

New York-based brand management firm Lippincott & Margulies compiled a list of 219 possible names. From the original list, they filtered out the last 10. Then after further debate, the list was narrowed down to five: Alexis, Caliber, Chaparel, Vectre and Verone. Alexis was the only name unanimously recognized by everyone present. But the most criticized thing about it is that it sounds like a person's name rather than a car name. What's worse is that Alexis is the name of a crazy woman in the TV series, which means infamous. Finally, John French, a project manager at Toyota Motor Sales of America and the main contact at the brand management company, based on some names Alexis casually wrote down, and Lexus was born. French crossed out the A in Alexis, and after some discussion, the group changed the i to u. The last name is LEXUS.

Next is the Lexus logo - the L letter surrounded by an ellipse. According to the official statement of Toyota Motor Sales Corporation of the United States, the arc of this ellipse is modified according to precise mathematical formulas, using more than three designers and designers. Advertiser, it took more than half a year to complete: a logo that stood out, beating five design pitches. In 1987, Molly Sanders, the head of Molly Designs Inc., spent three months crafting this unique oval and L to replace the original most promising candidate. Version - an L without a circle around it that looks like a seagull's wing.

The new Lexus logo made its debut at the Los Angeles Auto Show in January 1988.