Just 500 Toyota Corolla GR cars coming to Oz initially

Just 500 examples of the 2023 Toyota Corolla GR will come to Australia in 2023, as forecast by carsales back in May, and first local deliveries of the all-new hot hatch will arrive later than expected in the first quarter of next year.

It’s not yet clear how many of those will be the hotter two-seat Morizo Edition and Toyota Australia says it’s working with its parent company in Japan to secure a larger supply of cars for 2024.

Until then, however, demand for the 220kW Corolla GR will outstrip supply by a significant margin – as it did with the smaller GR Yaris, Australia’s entire 1000-unit initial allocation of which sold out within a week, forcing Toyota to close the order book in June 2021.

Speaking at the Corolla GR’s international media launch in the US, Hanley confirmed that expressions of interest will be taken by Toyota Australia dealers from tomorrow (September 15), and that plans were already in place to manage the small volume of cars imported in the first year to minimise short-selling by speculators.

Hanley said all dealers with a GR Corolla allocation would qualify each customer to ensure that they deserved to own Toyota’s answer to the Volkswagen Golf R.

“We want these cars to get to enthusiasts,” he said. “It's disturbing to think we have a few short-cycling our cars to make money. We need to protect our customers as best we can from those types of behaviours.”

Hanley said lessons were learned from the sold-out GR Yaris and that the Japanese brand would weed out profiteering scalpers in order to protect its customers.

He said Toyota and government both have a role to play in stamping out the practice of new-car buyers on-selling or ‘flipping’ in-demand vehicles for large profits, pushing up transaction prices and potentially extending wait times for many.

“It's important we take a leadership on this now as we've spent decades building trust around our brand,” said Hanley.

“That’s why it’s so deeply important we take that leadership position [to stamp out] any sort of price gouging, any sort of price scalping. We’ve got to stop that. Not only at Toyota, but as an industry.

“We want this situation changed. We want customers to pay a fair and reasonable price based on the manufacturer’s retail price.”

Average delivery waiting times for many popular models like the Toyota RAV4 Hybrid remain about 12 months and Toyota’s Australian order books for both the GR Yaris and LandCruiser 70 Series remain closed while demand outstrips supply for the foreseeable future.

A similar situation occurred with the Toyota LandCruiser 300 Series, wait times for which have reduced from over 12 months to about eight months, leading to extensive profiteering by owners of new and used examples.

Toyota now says it’s looking for ways to discourage opportunistic resellers who ‘short-cycle’ their near-new vehicles to make a quick profit, even if many buyers are prepared to pay well over list price to avoid long waiting times.

According to Hanley, Toyota Australia is investigating different mechanisms “within the legalities of Australian consumer and competition law” to ensure bone-fide customers pay fair prices for their new vehicles.

“We're looking at a whole load of processes now,” he said.

“Used cars are a different matter. But for a new car, we don’t want customers paying over the odds. We intend to investigate everything we can within the legalities of Australian consumer and competition law.

“I urge governments and authorities to please consider this proposition and what’s happening in the market now, because we’re all about protecting consumers. Yet we’re seeing this going on, so we’ve got to work together to say ‘hey, this has got to stop’.”

Hanley stopped short in discussing exactly what measures will be introduced and ruled out Toyota Australia itself verifying the intentions of individual customers.

And for those accusing dealers themselves of price gouging, Hanley said all Toyota Australia dealers are governed by legally-binding policies, industry standards and trading agreements and that they will continue to abide by the recommended retail price.

Some car dealerships in Japan and North America require customers to sign documents agreeing not to on-sell their vehicle within a certain timeframe for a quick profit, but similar arrangements are illegal in Australia.

“We are acutely aware of the legalities around these sorts of activities,” said Hanley.

“But it’s something that I think we’ve got to challenge, because we have governance around what we can and can’t do to protect consumers in terms of pricing and in terms of warranties.”

Toyota Australia’s sales boss would not confirm rumours that the GR Corolla will be priced from around $70,000 here – which would position it about $20K upstream of the GR Yaris – and nor would he reveal what spec Australians will be offered, but he did say that pricing would be “achievable”.

Toyota has just announced an $11,000 base price hike for the new GR86 coupe, which will start at $43,240 plus ORCs, and Hanley ruled out a repeat of the bargain $39,990 introductory offer that Toyota Australia used initially to superheat GR Yaris sales.

After first Aussie deliveries finally kick-off in early 2023, Hanley tips the GR Corolla will eventually become the best-selling GR in the car-maker's line-up, not least because it offers more space, practicality and an extra pair of doors over the GR Yaris and 86.

“Based on Corolla's history and heritage in this country I believe it will be the most popular GR,” he said.

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