Quote:
Originally Posted by Tcoat
We knew the wheelbase was shorter many months ago. That is not news.
And where is his mention of a 4 in this "interview"?
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This interview was not about a 4 cyl version -- it was about the prototype. I guess you didn't get that.... And I guess EVERYONE on this forum knew about the shorter wheelbase. After all, who else spends day and night posting? If I would have spent all that time over the years immersed in this forum I might have known. I'll work harder in the future to catch up to the king of the forum who knows all and sees all....
And I'll watch for all of the firings and lawsuits against the publications that quote Tada.... Perhaps with all of his quotes, if not true, Tada will be fired??????
Back and forth aside, corporate decisions on the continuance of a product are done on a yearly, then quarterly, basis. They watch sales, run ROI analyses, calculate break evens, and also integrate with future plans. So on an existing line, information from even a year ago may not be relevant. Competition also plays a role. I suspect the introduction of the RF hurt 86 sales in the longer term. What is true today, may not have been true even 6 months ago. But new car introductions require lead times and CAPEX. They must be planned over the longer term. So the tidbits of information we get from internal sources (like Tada) do have relevance. But information on the declination of existing products are much less reliable because those decisions are generally shorter term, competitive product acceptance is not known, and sales may show a lot of short term variance.
Thus, no matter what what said about keeping an existing product even 6 months ago, the decision may well change based on current sales data. Current volume of the 86 is declining much more rapidly than a normal decay curve would predict. Thus the likelihood of the 86 being discontinued would be significantly increased. Also, in this case, as time evolves, the company can gauge the pricing on new products, like the Supra, and determine the cannibalization from existing brands. There will be a segment of Supra buyers, like me, who may purchase it instead of the 86 even with a significant upcharge.
For those reasons, I do think it is highly probable that the 86 will be discontinued over the next couple of years. Obviously, companies will not comment on product discontinuations because it would hurt sales. So there will be virtually no corroborative information.