Photo: Toyota
Buying a new car is supposed to be one of the most exciting experiences and rightly so considering the amount of money involved. And yet, somehow, after the order is placed, everything is shrouded in mystery and there’s little you can do until the dealer calls you to tell you that your car has arrived. Toyota vows to offer more insight to its customers in the U.S. from the moment the car rolls off the production line and to the moment it gets on the dealer lot.
Many people buy their new vehicles online these days, most of the time without even seeing them. This strips away a great deal from the whole ordering process, but the hard part only now begins. It’s that part from the moment you get your VIN and the moment the dealer calls with the exciting news your ride awaits you. Especially in the past months, this also involves painfully long waiting times when no one tells you where is your car and when it will get to you. That’s when the dealer does not want to mark up the vehicle you ordered because he knows it’s in high demand.
Well, some carmakers thought about this ordeal their customers are facing and came up with some clever solutions. After General Motors started testing a new order tracking system with Corvette customers, we learned Toyota will launch a similar program in about a week. The “Project ETA” will arrive at Toyota and Lexus dealerships in the U.S. this summer, after being introduced at a dealer’s meeting next week.
Project ETA, as its name suggests, will help locate the cars in the intricate logistics chain of the automaker and will provide estimates about the delivery date. According to Keith Robertson, group vice president for supply chain management at Toyota Motor North America, the new system should improve the transparency of where a vehicle is in the delivery process. It will also provide timely notifications to dealers when there is a delay.
“It would be great to have some transparency so that we could tell a customer that their vehicle was going to be here in two weeks, or 10 days, or four months, whatever, but be able to update them when something changes,” explains for Automotive News Danny Wilson, head of the Toyota National Dealer Advisory Council.
More like a delivery smartphone app, the Project ETA will offer a graphical representation of where a vehicle is in the production or delivery process. The delays would also be communicated through this system and alerts can be set for various steps in the delivery process. This is of great help to the dealers, allowing them to offer meaningful information to customers when asked.
Well, some carmakers thought about this ordeal their customers are facing and came up with some clever solutions. After General Motors started testing a new order tracking system with Corvette customers, we learned Toyota will launch a similar program in about a week. The “Project ETA” will arrive at Toyota and Lexus dealerships in the U.S. this summer, after being introduced at a dealer’s meeting next week.
Project ETA, as its name suggests, will help locate the cars in the intricate logistics chain of the automaker and will provide estimates about the delivery date. According to Keith Robertson, group vice president for supply chain management at Toyota Motor North America, the new system should improve the transparency of where a vehicle is in the delivery process. It will also provide timely notifications to dealers when there is a delay.
“It would be great to have some transparency so that we could tell a customer that their vehicle was going to be here in two weeks, or 10 days, or four months, whatever, but be able to update them when something changes,” explains for Automotive News Danny Wilson, head of the Toyota National Dealer Advisory Council.
More like a delivery smartphone app, the Project ETA will offer a graphical representation of where a vehicle is in the production or delivery process. The delays would also be communicated through this system and alerts can be set for various steps in the delivery process. This is of great help to the dealers, allowing them to offer meaningful information to customers when asked.
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