The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
T TOYOTA CITY (IN TEXAS)
The new headquarters is a long way from Toyota’s humble beginnings in California
By TOM JENSEN, WWW.WHEELBASEMEDIA.COM
oyota Motor North America, Inc. (TMNA) is officially open for business in Plano, Tex., where the company has relocated its North American headquarters. Toyota’s move from Torrance, Calif., is part of a three-year “One Toyota” initiative to unite its quality engineering, sales marketing, financial services, and corporate functions in one location.
Plano, where the new headquarters is located, is about 20 miles northeast of Dallas. The new facility will employ up to 4,000 people including more than 1,000 new hires to go with those who have moved from existing Toyota operations in California, Kentucky and New York. Toyota officials say the automaker already has filled more than 75 percent of its open positions.
About 72 percent of the employees that Toyota asked to relocate agreed to make the move, Toyota officials said, compared to about 40 percent of Nissan workers who agreed to transfer to Tennessee from California when that automaker relocated its operations.
Toyota began moving employees to the $1-billion, 100-acre Plano facility in late spring. According to the company, on average, “a couple hundred team members per week are moving in, which is expected to continue in phases through December.”
The move to Plano coincides with Toyota’s 60th anniversary in the United States, where it already as made $23.4 billion in direct investments, with 10 manufacturing plants, nearly 1,500 Toyota and Lexus dealerships, and about 136,000 direct and dealer employees.
In addition, Toyota plans to spend an additional $10 billion in U.S. investments over the next five years, including building out the Plano headquarters and improving existing manufacturing plants.
It has been a long journey since Halloween of 1957, when Toyota Motor Sales, U.S.A., Inc. set up shop in a former Rambler dealership in Hollywood, Calif. Sales began in 1958, and in its first year in the United States, Toyota sold 287 Toyopet Crown sedans and one Land Cruiser.
By 1966, U.S. sales reached 20,000 a year, and by the end of 1975, Toyota had edged out Volkswagen as the best-selling import brand in the United States. In 1989, Toyota rolled out its premium Lexus brand, and barely a decade later, Lexus outsold Mercedes-Benz to become the Number One selling luxury brand in this country.
Now, Toyota has a huge North American footprint and a new and fabulous home with a host of functional amenities. “Workers will be able to eat breakfast and lunch at 11 different locations, surrounded by airy communal seating. If they need to pick up allergy medicine or whey protein, employees can hit an on-site convenience store,” wrote the Dallas Morning News about the Plano facility. “The fitness center has a two-story rock climbing wall.”
Naturally, the Plano HQ features state-of-the-art ecological features as well, enough to earn the facility the coveted LEED Platinum certification from the U.S. Green Building Council.
But the biggest draw for those working for Toyota might simply be the affordability of Texas over southern California. After Toyota announced its decision to relocate in 2014, Bloomberg. com’s Virginia Postrel noted that the average house in Torrance cost about $552,000 then, while the average housing price in Plano was less than $200,000.
Plano housing prices have spiked sharply with Toyota’s arrival, but the Texas city is still a relative bargain.
“With most of California and the bigger East Coast cities, their median prices are well above ours,” Ted Wilson, a principal with Dallas-based Residential Strategies, told the Dallas Morning News.