"The salesman was wonderful!" - Katherine H.
For more reviews like Katherine's, click here.
Friday, July 29, 2011
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Toyota Used Vehicles: The ‘Better Alternative’ Says CBS Money Watch
http://moneywatch.bnet.com/spending/blog/cars-money/used-cars-5-to-avoid-and-5-better-alternatives/3260/?tag=content;col1
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Teach your kids about charity with Toyota's 100 Cars for Good!
As a parent, I know it’s my responsibility to teach my kids certain values. Studying. Teamwork. Setting goals. Thinking of other people. With most of these, it’s an easy fix: reward them for getting good grades, put them on a sports team and let them learn winning is more fun and winning happens when they play as a team, give them a video game they really want to conquer and let them at it.
But how do you get your kids to stop and think about people who are less fortunate in the midst of your busy life? I mean, you’ve already got them studying and on a sports team or two and playing their Wii, on top of just being kids. That’s a lot already. And as the parent, since I’m not personally involved in any charities, I can’t just tell them to learn from my example.
Well, Toyota has a pretty easy fix for this problem with their “One Hundred Cars for Good” program. They are giving away 100 cars, over the course of 100 days, to 100 different charities.
What’s even better is that we get to pick the charities. They have it set up so that the pool of 500 charities gets narrowed down to the 100 winners by public voting. Every day between now and August 16 (this actually started back in May), we get a new group of five charities to pick from. So every day there is a new vote, and a new charity gets picked to be one of the 100.
So what do they get? Well, Toyota is giving them a new car, which is a pretty sweet deal for anyone. Plus it’s a new Toyota, and we know they are a quality company with reliable cars. In fact, my family is considering replacing a vehicle, and the top of our wish list is a Toyota Sienna.
Then if you watch any of the videos the individual non-profits put up about their program and why they need a car, you realize how big a deal this is for them. A lot of these people are using their own cars for this work. How many volunteers either drop out or hang back because of that? How much does not having a dedicated vehicle limit what these groups can do? A new car they can depend on is going to go a long way for them. It would be a special contribution, and one you can really feel good about helping them get. That’s because all the groups made a video to show you exactly what they’re going to use the new Toyota for, so you can see the work they already do and what the possibilities to expand are.
Let me bring this back home and point out how easy this is for you to do with your kids. You go in to Facebook, and you access the Toyota 100 Cars for Good App. Then you pick a favorite charity of the day and vote. That simple.
It’s not a big time commitment. It’s not something you have to leave your house to do. It’s not just writing a check to the SPCA where you adopted the family dog from. It’s quick and easy, but it does help. And it’s an easy way to get your kids thinking about charity and helping others and how it’s not just the big obvious things we see on TV, like animal rescues or natural disaster clean-up. You can find stuff in your area, or you can find things that your kids are going to care about. Watch the videos with them so they can see how much a handful of people can make a difference. Maybe all you do with them now is click a button to vote for an NPO, but in a few years maybe they join one of these groups on their own because they want to help.
And that’s what the point of parenting is, really, to open your kids’ eyes to the options. I don’t know if they’ll be scholars just because they get a treat for a good report card. I don’t know if they’ll be athletes or team players in life just because they play sports now. I don’t know if they’ll grow up and volunteer on their own. But I do know it’s my job to give them the seeds for those ideas to grow and blossom later.
Vote now through August 16 for your favorite charities! Go to the Toyota 100 Cars for Good page on Facebook to access the full list of non-profits and search them by voting date, location, or type of charity. It’s quick, it’s easy, and it’s a great way to show your kids that helping others is easy!
100CarsForGood
Friday, July 22, 2011
Toyota shows self-steering car at safety demonstration
We already have cars that can take control of the brakes, park for us and maintain a safe distance from the car in front of us. Soon some Toyota models will be veering themselves away from accidents, too.
The new system uses cameras and a supersensitive radar called millimeter wave. Together, they help detect impending frontal crashes, such as one caused by a pedestrian crossing the street, and help the car take steps to avoid collision.
According to Toyota's chief safety technology officer, Moritaka Yoshida, the vehicle instantly calculates how much braking and steering are needed to avoid a crash.
Toyota didn't say when the technology would hit the market but hinted that it would be soon, the Detroit News reported.
Last month, Volkswagen demonstrated a car that could drive itself using radar, cameras and ultrasonic sensors.
During the safety demonstration, Toyota also presented a pop-up hood that rises slightly during a pedestrian crash. The action would soften the blow to a person being hit by the front of the car. Both Jaguar and French automaker Citroën currently use the technique.
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Toyota confirms electric Rav4 for 2012
Toyota affirmed today that an electric version of its Rav4 small SUV would go on sale to the public in 2012. Other reports had suggested the vehicle would be available only for fleets.
The new Rav4 EV will use a Tesla-built drive system, and get 100 miles of range in real-world driving. Toyota showed off a concept version of the Rav4 EV at last year's Los Angeles auto show.
Earlier this month, Toyota announced an electric version of its Scion iQ city car. With the Rav4 EV, Toyota says it will be the only automaker offering two electric cars in 2012.
Monday, July 18, 2011
Good job Rudy and Lou for providing Kelly with great customer service!
"I bought my Tundra from Toyota of Santee..Rudy help me and he was great without any pressure at all!! Lou in financing was wonderful. I went to several lots before Santee and was very disappointed. Everyone at Toyota of Santee was helpful and quick. I got several follow up calls after to make sure I was still happy." - Kelly
For more reviews like Kelly's, click here.
Friday, July 15, 2011
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Thank you Francine for this short and sweet review!
For more reviews like Francine's, click here.
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Kyle Busch wins first Kentucky Sprint Cup race
The Joe Gibbs Racing driver started from pole position, led the most laps but had to defend his lead on the final two-lap sprint against Johnson. Although the Hendrick driver was initially able to keep the pressure on, he then came under attack from a charging David Reutimann (Michael Waltrip Racing), allowing Busch to pull ahead to his third win of the season.
Busch had also won Thursday's Truck Series race, which meant Saturday's victory places him only one shy of his 100th NASCAR win.
"This is right up there with the best of them. I haven't won the big ones but this is as good as it gets, man. The way we won was awesome," said Busch, who has jumped up to the top of the standings and has all but locked up a place in this year's Chase.
Track position and running in clean air proved crucial on the bumpy Kentucky asphalt, and although Busch was ahead of the field for longer than his rivals, Penske's Brad Keselowski proved to be a threat after he took the lead for the first time on lap 142 having stayed out during the second caution of the day.
Keselowski, winner of Saturday's Nationwide Series race, led 79 laps but lost a couple of seconds at his final planned stop for fuel under green with 27 laps remaining. That probably cost him the chance to put up a tougher fight for victory in the end, eventually crossing the finish line in seventh.
"At the end, the restarts are just a crapshoot," said Keselowski. "If you get the bottom lane, you're going backwards. I kept getting in an odd position and just kept getting on the bottom lane. Every restart just kept playing against us. A great effort by this race team and that makes me proud. We led laps and were competitive all night."
His team-mate Kurt Busch also led a good portion of the race but finished only ninth in the end.
Reutimann got a lucky break when the fifth caution of the day waved as everyone but him had completed their final scheduled stops for fuel. When Dale Earnhardt Jr blew a left-front tire after stopping for fuel, only seven cars were on the lead lap, which meant the Michael Waltrip Racing driver was able to stop under caution and drop only a handful of spots.
Johnson was a top-five contender for most of the evening and his second place in the end allowed him to move up a spot in the points to fifth place. Stewart Haas' Ryan Newman recovered from being a lap down to finish fourth behind Johnson after a bold final restart.
Roush Fenway's Carl Edwards rounded out the top five ahead of his team-mate Matt Kenseth, while last week's Daytona winner David Ragan continued to move up in the standings with an eighth place finish.
Tony Stewart was a top five contender but in the end he had to make do with 12th while similarly Earnhardt Ganassi's Juan Pablo Montoya was only 15th after being sent to the rear of the field for the penultimate restart while he was running seventh, following a penalty for speeding in the pits. The Colombian had been a contender for a solid finish before that.
Former points leader Kevin Harvick struggled to a 16th place finish and dropped down to third in the standings.
The inaugural Cup event at Kentucky proved a success in terms of attendance as numbers reportedly exceeded the 106,000 grandstand capacity, although such crowds made for massive traffic issues both before and after the event, with some fans even being unable to reach the track.
Results - 267 laps: Pos Driver Team/Car Time/Gap 1. Kyle Busch Gibbs Toyota 2h55m00.000s 2. David Reutimann Waltrip Toyota + 0.179s 3. Jimmie Johnson Hendrick Chevrolet + 0.233s 4. Ryan Newman Stewart Haas Chevrolet + 0.887s 5. Carl Edwards Roush Fenway Ford + 1.158s 6. Matt Kenseth Roush Fenway Ford + 1.398s 7. Brad Keselowski Penske Dodge + 1.506s 8. David Ragan Roush Fenway Ford + 1.544s 9. Kurt Busch Penske Dodge + 1.576s 10. Jeff Gordon Hendrick Chevrolet + 1.971s 11. Denny Hamlin Gibbs Toyota + 1.972s 12. Tony Stewart Stewart Haas Chevrolet + 2.270s 13. Kasey Kahne Red Bull Toyota + 2.374s 14. Joey Logano Gibbs Toyota + 2.702s 15. Juan Pablo Montoya Earnhardt Ganassi Chevrolet + 2.737s 16. Kevin Harvick Childress Chevrolet + 2.852s 17. Regan Smith Furniture Row Chevrolet + 3.069s 18. Martin Truex Jr Waltrip Toyota + 3.380s 19. Jeff Burton Childress Chevrolet + 3.496s 20. Marcos Ambrose Petty Ford + 3.544s 21. Greg Biffle Roush Fenway Ford + 3.682s 22. Mark Martin Hendrick Chevrolet + 3.962s 23. Landon Cassill Phoenix Chevrolet + 6.157s 24. Paul Menard Childress Chevrolet + 1 lap 25. Casey Mears Germain Toyota + 1 lap 26. Bobby Labonte JTG Daugherty Toyota + 1 lap 27. Brian Vickers Red Bull Toyota + 2 laps 28. AJ Allmendinger Petty Ford + 2 laps 29. Travis Kvapil Front Row Ford + 2 laps 30. Dale Earnhardt Jr Hendrick Chevrolet + 2 laps 31. David Gilliland Front Row Ford + 3 laps 32. Andy Lally TRG Chevrolet + 3 laps 33. Dave Blaney Baldwin Chevrolet + 3 laps 34. Mike Bliss FAS Lane Ford + 3 laps Retirements: Clint Bowyer Childress Chevrolet 259 laps Jamie McMurray Earnhardt Ganassi Chevrolet 198 laps Scott Wimmer Gordon Dodge 90 laps Tony Raines Front Row Ford 38 laps Joe Nemechek NEMCO Toyota 37 laps JJ Yeley Whitney Chevrolet 35 laps Michael McDowell HP Toyota 32 laps Scott Riggs Whitney Chevrolet 28 laps Mike Skinner Germain Toyota 17 laps
Monday, July 11, 2011
The Best New Hybrids Make The Best Used Hybrids
Toyota Certified Used Hybrids
TCUV is pleased to announce a first of-its-kind program – Toyota Certified Used Hybrids. With a new logo and tagline, the objective of this program is to increase awareness and drive sales of certified used hybrid vehicles while supporting Toyota’s company wide initiative of promoting Hybrid Synergy Drive (HSD). In addition, there are four key benefits to launching this certified hybrid program.
The benefits of this program are:
- Raise awareness of Toyota certified hybrid vehicles
- Increase consumer demand of Toyota certified hybrids
- Drive traffic to facilitate next generation Prius sales & support C/G Prius trade-in values (at launch)
- Support residual value of current Prius and other Toyota HSD vehicles
The Toyota Certified Used Hybrid program elements are similar to that of our current certified program, but with an increased emphasis on educating consumers and easing apprehension for purchasing a used hybrid vehicle.
The Toyota Certified Used Hybrid program elements are:
- 3-Month / 3,000-Mile Comprehensive Warranty
- 7-Year / 100,000-Mile Limited Powertrain Warranty
- 7-Year / 100,000-Mile Roadside Assistance
- 174-Point Quality Assurance Inspection (an additional 14 inspection points)
- CARFAX® Vehicle History Report™
- 8-Year / 100,000-Mile Factory Hybrid Battery Warranty (Minimum required coverage). Coverage in California Emission Warranty States is up to 10-Years / 150,000-Miles. States include: California, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania and Vermont.
- Standard New-Car Financing Rates Available
To support the launch of this program, Toyota Certified has created an all-new comprehensive marketing campaign. The campaign targets both the general and Hispanic markets, with spot radio ads, interactive ad units, search engine marketing keywords, and hybrid micro-websites in both English and Spanish. We are kicking off the campaign with a TMS headquarters display, as well as, a launch announcement this weekend at the NADA convention. To create a buzz at NADA, we have positioned a full-page print ad announcing our launch in the NADA version of Automotive News on January 26th. In addition to these launch events, we placed today a press release on the wires, updated all Toyota Certified Hybrid logos on 3rd party sites (AutoMart.com, Cars.com, AutoTrader.com), updated the TCUV HUB, created all-new point of sale materials, and placed the new marketing logos and ads on Toyota Ad Planner. All the elements are in place to ensure the launch of the hybrid brand extension a success!
Congratulations to Rudy for being mentioned in this great review!
For more reviews like Kelly's, click here.
Friday, July 8, 2011
Toyota expands Buckle Up for Life to 6 states
Toyota has made a $1 million commitment to support the expansion of Buckle Up for Life, which began in Ohio, Kentucky and California and now will expand to Illinois, Colorado and Texas by the end of 2012, with even more places to be chosen for assistance in 2013.
The program was initially put into action by the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center to assist African American and Hispanic children, teens and adults killed or injured in car crashes.
“We created Buckle Up for Life because we were seeing a disproportionate number of African American and Hispanic children coming into the hospital with severe crash-related injuries. This disparity was unacceptable and we knew we had to do something about it,” said Dr. Rebeccah L. Brown, associate director of Trauma Services and director of the Buckle Up for Life program at Cincinnati Children’s.
“We appreciate the significant input and support that Toyota has provided at every step of the way.”
With Toyota's commitment of funds, Buckle Up for Life will expand from Cincinnati and Los Angeles, where it made its debut in 2010, to Chicago, Denver and San Antonio. It will provide safety measures and education designed to greatly reduce the number of fatalities resulting from vehicle crashes within the Hispanic and African-American communities. Current programs that include blessing children's cars seats (pictured, in Los Angeles) will continue.
“Safety is a critical priority for Toyota,” said Patricia Pineda, Toyota’s group VP of national philanthropy.
“In addition to enhancing the safety of our own vehicles, we are dedicated to supporting education programs that help protect drivers and passengers at every stage of life. Buckle Up for Life has proven to be a successful and sustainable model for meeting the pressing needs of the community, and Toyota is proud to support its expansion.”
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention statistics show car crashes are one of the leading causes of death in Hispanic and African-American communities, in part because seat-belt usage is sometimes poor and car seats for children and infants are improperly used.
In addition, studies from the centers and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration make these observations:
1. Hispanic children are three times more likely to die in a vehicle crash than Caucasian children.
2. Automobile crashes are the leading cause of death for African Americans under the age of 14 and the second leading cause of death between the ages of 15-34.
3. Not wearing seat belts is the main cause of accidental injury-related deaths for African Americans of all ages while motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death for Hispanics 1 to 44.
In response to these alarming facts, in 2004 Cincinnati Children’s joined with Toyota to create Buckle Up for Life – or “Abróchate a la Vida” in Spanish – a multi-generational, faith-based safety initiative in 17 Hispanic churches in northern Kentucky and Cincinnati that provides interactive vehicle safety education, free child car safety seats and car-seat inspections to encourage safety habits among drivers and passengers.
The impact of Buckle Up for Life in Cincinnati continues to be substantial. The number of Hispanic adults and children using seat belts and car seats has more than doubled, according to data gathered by Toyota, the hospital and area agencies.
We would like to thank Greg for this great review!
For more reviews like Greg's, click here.
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Toyota Launches 'High-Performance' Prius?
Ask any Prius owner why they purchased their car, and the responses will likely include fuel economy, reduced emissions, cost savings and potentially even the car’s futuristic styling. We’d be willing to bet no one would respond with superior handling, crisp turn-in, straight line acceleration or slalom speed. The Prius isn’t a sports car and it falls short of most people’s definition of a sporty car. Instead, it’s a fuel efficient hybrid that blends practicality with affordability and even ride comfort.
Toyota wants Prius buyers to think outside the box, so they’re offering a limited-edition Prius Plus Performance Package. The kit is color matched to cars in Blizzard Pearl, Classic Silver Metallic, Black or Winter Gray Metallic and can be added to any Prius Two, Three or Four model for $3,699, or to any Prius Five model for $2,999.
The package includes a body kit with front and rear bumper spoilers, side skirts and a unique rear diffuser; Toyota says this improves the Prius’ already-admirable coefficient of drag, but they fail to specify by how much. Next comes 17-inch wheels, forged for lighter weight and fitted with wider tires, followed by lowering springs and a stiffer rear sway bar. Rounding things out is a unique Plus exterior badge and Plus carpeted floor mats.
No changes are made to the hybrid powertrain, so horsepower isn’t upped and fuel economy remains unchanged (although lighter wheels and less drag should net you a small gain). Still, Prius Plus Performance Package cars really will go around corners quicker than their stock counterparts, which may be a selling point to a small minority of buyers. Dealers will begin taking orders for the kit this month.
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