From an economic perspective, explain Toyota's exclusive TRD Pro grille

This is very interesting and has really made me think about Toyota's thought process here.

Toyota designs the grille for the TRD Pro Tacoma in 2017. People fall in LOVE with it after they discover it is a drop in replacement for ANY Tacoma of any trim. Why not? The grill is retro cool, it's all black, it flows with the body well, it's one piece, and frankly it doesn't look as hokey as grilles from the higher trim packages. Based on demand and what I see here, I would say it's the most popular mod and grille for the truck. Before I knew a thing about Tacomas after I bought mine, the first time I saw the TRD pro grille I knew I had to have it. It was probably one of my first searches on here.

Now. Toyota attempts to hold exclusivity on the grille for the pros and keeps the price point arbitrarily high. They also require a VIN. Ok. People found a workaround, and many bought the grill at the $350-$400 price point. Moneywise, Toyota doesn't care. What's a few $ million in grille sales compared to hundreds of millions of truck sales?

This is where the free market steps in. Demand exceeded Toyota's capability to provide for the market and the market found a way around it. Enter cheap overseas manufacturing. For all of the purists, sorry guys, many of these grilles are probably made on the same molds with the same materials in the same shops as your OEM parts, probably on the third shift. The tooling costs would exceed the manufacturer's buy-in for NRE, at least up front. One could argue that when these started selling by the thousands, that some shops probably at that point did opt to make their own tooling (I'm sure off of the original cad files) to support the market and that's the deluge of $79 grilles. I digress.

Here is where Toyota mis-stepped in my opinion. They should have realized quickly when the PRO orders started coming in well in excess of the Pros manufactured that their customer base was telling them something. Not for the money, but for the customers, they should have done 2 things:

1- Released the original pro grille design for general purchase in high volume; in doing so, dropped the cost to be competitive with the clone market. I would be willing to pay probably up to a 40% premium over the clones for a genuine OEM part, up to say , maybe around $150 for a box that says TOYOTA and makes me feel good.

2- Quickly redesigned the pro grille for the 2018 or even 2019 market with some tweaks (badging, letters, grille pattern, finish, something) that would have still given the pro exclusivity. People would still be happy with the base pro grille and the pro guys would still have their own thing.

Again, this isn't about the money, Toyota doesn't care about these millions in sales of aftermarket parts. It would have been good for their loyal market and it would have probably saved that much money or more for all of the attorneys they are paying for the cease and desist letters I'm sure they send out everyday.

I type this as I truly was trying to find a reasonable OEM pro grille option, but have succumbed to purchasing the clone. It looks like just in the last month that Toyota has really ratcheted down on the OEM sales and now all of the clones have to sell the grilles with the OOTOYA letters 'in the box'. The market will always find a way.

 

Lots of folks (not just Toyota) try to ignore the free market.

It doesn't work.

 

A third-shift replica isn't going to be an authentic part and it's going to be a lot more of a pain dealing with warranty issues using non-authentic parts. I had (let's be real, still have) TSS false-positive issues and they updated software somewhere because the OEM grille doesn't make that much a difference. All I had to tell them was that this was an OEM grille purchased with the vehicle, they validated, and my work was free.

Not to mention there's the cred of having the authentic part. With anything aftermarket you're gambling on getting the real thing made after hours or some cheap knockoff. You don't know what you're getting and many are not this third-shft part you speak of - many require assembly to avoid litigation of selling a part with "TOYOTA" on the grille and require you to add a letter or something.

Really it's all about exclusivity which is 100% ignoring the market (and not uncommon across most industries where it has value). The Pro isn't that special a truck compared to the others like buying a Raptor or ZR2 so they differentiated visually. If everyone could buy the grille and fogs and other visual parts, there's no reason to buy a Pro when an Off-Road can get you all the Pro can at a much lower price.

Just to add on an edit, I also don't think the grille is as popular as you think it is - definitely not enough to make a second version. It's popular in certain segments of Tacoma owners and popular on enthusiast boards but I have met plenty of owners who have commented negatively on mine. I looks good on a rugged truck where it complements the black fenders and bumper on an OR or Pro but I'm honestly not a fan of it on the other trims - especially the Sport with body color everything. It's too matte.

 

I don’t think Toyota is trying to keep them exclusive for Pros. Last time I talked to a dealer about it, it was to ensure that they had parts in stock for replacements.

How shitty would it be if you owned a Pro and busted it but you couldn’t get a new grill because some dude in an SR5 bought the last one.

 

I belive this to be true.


Also dealing with the cloners is terrible. Everybody and their mother was buying and selling clone grilles. There was even a thread for it. There were scams. Really funny scams too. There was a fella here who posted about buying a grille from overseas from a seller named something like “goldjewelyplusexcitement” or some equally dumb name. Then, the package showed up. And it was fake jewels. Lol.
People so funny.

 

The OEM grilles are made in the US so the third shift theory really doesn't work. I agree with above that Toyota really only cares about keeping them in stock for replacements on Pro trucks. They have priced them to discourage the purchase of them.

 

Toyota isn't worried about the sale of a few thousand spare parts $200 parts. They are focused on selling millions of $40,000 vehicles. They forecast spare parts and fit it into their distribution model. They don't use that channel to sell aftermarket upgrades. The attractions has caused a disruption in the channel that they don't seem interested in changing. I assume the profitability doesn't justify the effort. That is simple business. Instead they modify the channel to make sure that it works the way it should.

Toyota does listen to the customer and makes changes every year to sell more vehicles. That is whey we don't see the same model year after year. This happened with the pro only colors available on all models in subsequent years. Occasionally they will make changes mid model as they did with the 2003 4 runner and dropped the unpainted cladding 4 months into the model year and all were painted the same as the Limited version.

 

I think the grille I just bought said 832 sold. I see them everywhere. I would say 10-20%.

Some of y'all take the oem a little too serious. It's a molded piece of plastic that holds a sensor with which I'm sure are pretty loose tolerances.

 

It's peace of mind. To me the financial cost wasn't significant and as someone who has rejected his fair share of warranty work for aftermarket modifications, I wasn't about to give Toyota that out. Even one trip to the dealership for TSS issues would cover the difference in cost so for me, it's a no brainer.

10-20% grilles or Pros? Either way that's super high... that would be around 70k to date even on the low end of that scale and neither are super common out here on the east coast. I think I've seen half a dozen Pro trucks on the VA side of DC and maybe as many grilles other than my own. I'd believe that in some areas it's even higher than that but as a whole, I'd be surprised if even 5% of all Tacomas have the OEM grille.

 

I don't care for the grill myself, but there's no denying their popularity. I'd say your 10-20%, at least here in east Tennessee isn't far off base.

 

So is there proof that the clones cause a tss warning and the oem does not?

 

The dealer doesn't have to prove it mechanically. You've moved the sensor using a non-OEM part. That's enough for a warranty rejection.

 

Somebody had a little to much coffee this morning

 

I bought my OEM Pro grille from a Toyota dealer. They had 4 or 5 in stock at the parts department, and sold it to me without any questions. They even had them on display to encourage sales of this part. I don’t know what this thread is about.

 

If Toyota wanted to make a new grille they would have to pay an engineer for two weeks of their time, plus a designer the same, plus probably marketing and study group costs. And then they'd have to pay a hundred thousand dollars for a new mold to be made.

So probably half a million dollars? It's not gonna happen. Not when this one is so popular.

 

I think this hits the nail on the head.

 

TRD is an afterthought. Once they pull you in with the TRD models i.e. Sport, Off Road and Pro... If it’s not a dealer mark up add on... They could give two shits less about making profit from these parts and they have them but don’t rely try to push them out. I have had 3 Tacoma’s and NONE of them has asked if I wanted to add an intake, exhaust, etc.

This isn’t a big market like other manufacturers have. They don’t rely on these parts to make significant profit. If they did they would push parts on buyers and have WAY more advertising. Toyota is strange if you haven’t already noticed...

 

I love being a clone. I love the fact that there is a Pro owner looking at my truck thinking “Yeah he wished he would have bought a Pro, so he wants to look like he has one, fucking poser”....

Meanwhile behind my tint I’m fanning myself with the $12,000 I saved by buying a measly peasant Off Road! LOL!!!

 

Is there any other manufacturer that will not sell you a part unless you give a Vin showing you have the vehicle ? I've never heard of anything like this before. I can't even believe that's legal being it's not for something like medical use, hazardous, safety etc.