Toyota’s Tacoma Pickup Takes On All Comers and Remains on Top

Even in the middle of a pandemic, there’s one model that auto dealer Crown Toyota in Ontario, California, can’t keep on the lot: the Tacoma pickup. With just a 10-day supply of the truck -- in an industry where 60 days is considered ideal -- most are already sold before they’re unloaded from the car hauler.

Toyota Motor Corp. has three North American factories cranking out Tacomas, but Crown’s general manager Paxton Gagnet is constantly requesting more.

“We ask every day, politely, politely,” Gagnet says. “It is very difficult.”

Known as the Taco among its legions of loyalists, it’s certainly not the newest model on the lot. Toyota last gave it a full update four years ago. And it’s not the most refined either: Reviewers ding it for a rugged ride on the highway. But it’s a beast off road, has Toyota’s vaunted durability and commands premium prices on the used-car lot. That helps explain how it’s outselling an onslaught of new rivals in a red-hot U.S. market for smaller trucks.

The Tacoma is to midsize pickups what the Ford F-Series is to full-size trucks: a dominant player that has remained the best-seller of its kind for the last 14 years. Sales, which rose 8% last month, have more than doubled this decade, even as General Motors Co. fielded the Chevrolet Colorado and GMC Canyon, Ford Motor Co. revived the Ranger model and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV rolled out the Jeep Gladiator.