Meet The Most American Sedan: The Toyota Avalon

Bertel Schmitt
by Bertel Schmitt

Red Avalon – now with extra white and blue

Very few car buying decisions are guided by patriotic motivations. And the few there are, are rarely supported by hard data. Which spares us embarrassing moments. “Many of the ‘most American’ cars on dealership lots today are made by Japanese automakers,” says Edmunds. ”The most American sedan, for example, is Toyota Avalon, and the most American hatchback is Honda Crosstour.”

Most American VehiclesCategoryVehicleLocal Content*SedansToyota Avalon80%SUV/CrossoversFord Expedition80%MinivansDodge Grand Caravan80%HatchbacksHonda Crosstour75%TrucksFord F-150, Toyota Tundra75%ConvertiblesChrysler 20074%CoupesChevrolet Camaro71%WagonsCadillac CTS Wagon, Toyota Venza65%* Percentage of U.S./Canadian content based on information reported by carmakers to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) under the American Automobile Labeling Act (AALA).

This is a list of the “most American cars” by segment, using – your tax dollars at work – the definition set by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and that of the American Automobile Labeling Act. Under which, by the way, a car would be pure American if it is built from 100% Canadian parts.

Bertel Schmitt
Bertel Schmitt

Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.

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  • JD-Shifty JD-Shifty on Jul 03, 2013

    who cares where it was simply assembled? it's the corporate, design and R &D base of origin that matters.

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    • Power6 Power6 on Jul 03, 2013

      @jimbob457 The R&D locations are probably even harder to track than parts content. Does anyone commenting here even know what the proportion of price paid for a car R&D is. Not that it doesn't matter but I'm pretty sure the bulk of the cost of a car is simply to make it and put it together. Local assembly is a whole lot of dollars in the pockets of your fellow Americans.

  • JD-Shifty JD-Shifty on Jul 04, 2013

    Also where are the parts sourced, and where are the main components like engine, trans, diff, etc made? doesn't do us much good if the Japanese or others only use their own sources.

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    • JD-Shifty JD-Shifty on Jul 05, 2013

      @Lorenzo not for the engine and trans. How many have an engine plant here besides Honda?

  • CelticPete CelticPete on Jul 04, 2013

    His assumption is not really that misguided. Japan ranks well behind that of most of the developed world in female empowerement. Japanese women hold few high paying jobs, less of them work, and few of them are involved in government to fix this. "Japan placed 42nd among 75 nations, just ahead of Macedonia, in the United Nations’s Development Program’s “gender empowerment measure,” an index of female participation in a nation’s economy and politics, in 2006." "In November 2011, Kyodo reported: “The level of political empowerment of Japanese women is more than two times lower than the world average, according to a report on gender equality released the World Economic Forum in November 2011. The influence that Japanese women wield over political decision-making processes is only 7.2 percent of the level of their male counterparts, against a world average of 18.5 percent, according to the forum's Global Gender Gap Report 2011. [Source: Mainichi Japan, Kyodo, November 2, 2011] " "Japan ranks 101 out of the 135 countries covered by the report. Commenting on the low level of representation of women at the ministerial and parliamentary levels worldwide, WEF Executive Chairman Klaus Schwab said in the report, "A system where women are not represented at the highest levels is both an unequal and an inefficient system." From a more general perspective on gender equality, the forum's Gender Gap Index for 2011 put Japan in 98th position. The index includes economic, educational and health-related considerations in addition to political empowerment." I get that this site has alot of Japanese car fans. Put Japan itself is highly sexist and xenophobic. Its not even an argument. At least legally the Japanese women have rights though. It's not like Saudi Arabia where you wife is legally your property. Luckily we don't buy alot of oil from the Saudi's anymore..

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    • Summicron Summicron on Jul 04, 2013

      @juicy sushi Holy crap... I was once eviscerated by the female Japanese founder of one of the largest tech translation companies. They offered me a job completely outside my expertise, I told them no, they continued to cajole. I said OK, I'll try but will defer to anyone more competent they might find while I work on it and if I couldn't do it I'd tell them two weeks before the deadline. But this arrangement was made with a secretary, not boss-lady herself. I wanted in this agency like I wanted my next breath so I spent three days in a medical library trying to come up to speed with the basic concepts and jargon, sufficient to convince me that I had no more chance than a Kardashian of delivering a professional result. I duly and immediately informed the agency, sucked up the disappointment and moved on. Two days later shachou Herself called me and I got the most acerbic tongue lashing of my life from someone I needed to impress. All my warnings and provisos to the secretary meant nothing, I had let the agency down and had "no right to hang out your shingle". Needless to say, they never again called me. Takeaway: 1)Never conclude important agreements solely with subordinates no matter how remote and intimidating the boss may be. 2)Anyone who thinks Japanese women are downtrodden, meek, fluttering little things has never crossed one, particularly a successful professional.

  • Namstrap Namstrap on Jul 04, 2013

    Back in the early seventies, I became a parts person in a Datsun dealership. From there it was all imports. I remember the complaints and flag waving from the big three. I'm still in parts, but now with a GM dealer. More and more of our stuff comes from off shore. It doesn't make it better or worse, but to call our cars American would be a laugh. A few years ago I took a tour around the shop at the end of the day. There was a Tahoe, a Suburban, a couple of Sierras or Silverados, a Toyota Corolla, Chevy Sprint, Honda Civic, and a Tracker. I live in Canada. Guess what vehicles were built in Canada. All the ones you would have called imported. All the so-called domestic ones were built in Mexico. It's a truly changing world.

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