“How much longer do we have to wait?!” “Our trip is ruined!”
In the past, many such complaints could be heard at Toyota Rent a Car’s Naha Airport Shop in Okinawa Prefecture.
During the summer holiday season, lines of tourists snaked out the door, with some waiting up to two and a half hours to pick up their cars. When it came to customer satisfaction, the branch ranked lowest in the Kyushu-Okinawa region.
Today, however, the whole process from the reception counter to driving away takes about 10 minutes. Behind this dramatic reduction in wait times lies a system known as TSL, or Toyota Sales Logistics.
Some 30 years ago, TPS was taken from its factory floor roots and incorporated into the company’s sales force. The employee responsible was none other than Akio Toyoda, then a sub-section manager who had set up a team to improve sales operations.
TPS is about making work easier, thoroughly eliminating waste, and delivering quality products to customers in a timely and affordable way.
These principles and methods were adapted for dealers to improve the flow of products, resulting in the TSL system.
Today, many dealers are steadily making improvements through TSL and using the extra capacity they gain to provide new value for customers. The Naha Airport Shop’s efforts are just one example.
In this edition of Toyota Times News, we look at the TSL-driven kaizen unfolding in various dealerships, as well as the new challenges they are undertaking. What are individual branches doing to uniquely serve local customers?
Later in the episode, we also share footage from the world premiere of the new RAV4, which debuted in May.
Arriving six years after the last release in 2019, the new model is the first to feature Arene, Toyota’s software development platform. This RAV4 marks the company’s first step in mass-producing software-defined vehicles (SDVs), and its premiere reflected Toyota’s commitment to achieving zero traffic accidents.
A few months ahead of the public unveiling, President Sato introduced the new RAV4 to dealers—though not without some hiccups. Watch to see how President Sato ad-libbed his way out of the mishap in the latest Toyota Times News episode.
