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Toyota Supra Sales Plunges Despite Manual Gearbox Addition
The Toyota Supra is a good sportscar, and even though a new manual gearbox variant has been introduced, the Japanese auto giant recorded poor sales last year on the model.
As Toyota detailed in its year-end United States sales report Wednesday morning, the buying public purchased just 2,652 Supras over the past 12 months, which is a gutting 46% drop from 2022. Now, it’s not like anyone expected the row-your-own gearbox to singlehandedly skyrocket sales. Toyota itself anticipated that just one in four customers would spring for the manual model.
It wasn’t because sports cars have fallen out of favor, as U.S. sales of the Mazda MX-5 rose by almost the same amount, growing 45.4% versus the previous year to end 2023 with 8,937 units sold. Sales of Toyota’s GR86 were also down in the U.S., though they dropped just 7.7% to 11,078 units. The Supra’s poor performance in the market is even more shocking considering Toyota’s overall U.S. sales for 2023 increased by 6.6% to 2,248,477 units.
The Toyota Supra wasn’t the lone ship battling the storm. Rival models like Nissan’s new Z sports car and BMW’s Z4, which shares a platform with the Supra, also struggled in sales. The collective performance indicates a challenging market for sports coupes.
While the future success of the Supra hangs in the balance, its performance is critical for maintaining competition in the sports coupe category. Toyota and other manufacturers hope for a potential rebound in 2024. In the meantime, the message to enthusiasts is clear: enjoy internal combustion performance models while they still exist. As the automotive industry undergoes its most significant technological revolution, the fate of sports cars like the Toyota Supra remains uncertain.
Nissan Z Also Suffered Poor Sales
