(first posted 1/25/2018) There’s one thing I’ll never understand about the second-generation Toyota Paseo. Toyota wanted to make a compact coupe off the Tercel platform, something a little more stylish, right? I mean, who wants to pay extra for less practicality if they’re not getting a little more style or performance in the equation? So, why did Toyota style it to look like a little Camry coupe?
Don’t see it? How about now? There are the slim, rectangular taillights, and the rather large, recessed headlights. The Paseo manages to have more of a familial resemblance to the Camry than even the Camry’s contemporary coupe derivative, the Solara.
Surely it wouldn’t be appealing for a young, style-conscious shopper to have a little coupe that looks so much like Dad’s Camry but that’s how Toyota styled it. The Camry was (and is) an utterly respectable and hugely popular car but there was nothing terribly exciting about its styling and nothing particularly scintillating about its dynamics. Why not make the Paseo look like a smaller Celica or Supra instead?
We’ll never know. The Paseo took after the Camry in another respect, too: it just wasn’t very exciting to drive. The second-generation was merely a restyling of the 1991-vintage first and used the same humdrum 1.5 four-cylinder with 93 hp and 100 ft-lbs. Paseos were rather noisy, with competent but unexciting handling and a tad too much body lean in the corners. Well, maybe there’s something to be said for the Paseo’s honest styling, then, as it certainly didn’t suggest the car was sportier than it was.
But do you know what was even more honest? The cheaper Tercel 2-dr. Comparably equipped, the Tercel was around $2k cheaper, had the same engine, and boasted more rear seat room.
While the Camry has remained a sales juggernaut, the second-generation Paseo was a sluggish seller. The coupe market was contracting significantly by the mid-1990s and yet the Paseo was outpaced by rivals like the Hyundai Tiburon. That’s perfectly understandable—Hyundai’s image may have paled in comparison to Toyota’s but the Tiburon was keenly priced and adventurously styled, ideal for budget- and style-conscious shoppers. You could even get a Honda Civic coupe for the same price as a Paseo which, while hardly any more exciting to look at, was a lot more pleasurable to drive.
In 1996, Toyota sold just 6,069 Paseos in the US market. The following year, even with the addition of a convertible variant, Toyota sold just 2,762. Hyundai, in comparison, sold almost four times as many Tiburons. The imported Tercel was also suffering, with the Corolla offering more car for not much more money. Toyota quietly discontinued the Paseo from the US market (the Tercel followed it a year later) but continued to sell it in Canada and other markets, including Australia. Lord knows why, we didn’t care for it either.
I still don’t understand one thing: just what is the point of a compact coupe with no style, no pricing advantage, and marginal performance?
Related Reading:
Curbside Outtake: 1993-98 Honda Civic del Sol/CR-X – More Reboot Than Sequel
Curbside Classic: 1993-1999 Toyota Celica – Those Headlights
Why not style it to look like your company’s best seller?
I would think Toyota saw the Civic coupe as the Tercel coupe’s biggest competitor, the Civic didn’t set the world on fire.
I always looked at the Tercel as smaller than the Civic. Here’s how I mentally lined up the competing models, at least in the US.
Toyota – Honda – Ford
Tercel – ?? – Festiva/Aspire
Corolla – Civic – Escort
Camry (pre 92) – Accord (pre 94) – Tempo
Camry (post 92) – Accord (post 94) – Taurus
Oops,
Meant to say that the Civic didn’t set the world on fire WITH IT’S STYLING….
It’s a shame that Toyota wasn’t able to offer a version of the Paseo with a hotter engine.
I thought that the Paseo was a North American product only. I’m surprised to learn it was sold in Australia as well. It was a definite sales dud here.
For several years now a white Paseo has lived next door to me, here in Co Kerry. It’s not a grey import, it’s an official Toyota Ireland car.
Doesn’t make sense to me either, since they didn’t send us the Tercel it was based off. Back in those days if you wanted something sub-Corolla down here you’d go to a Daihatsu dealer and get a Charade or Sirion; they were a Toyota subsidiary. And arguably more interesting than any small Toyota.
Then we got the Echo & Scion when Toyota realized how far they had to go to capture the youth/small car market after these cars. That strategy backfired when millennials started preferring “aspirational” cars (ex. A parent’s old BMW) rather than saving pennies for something quirky and different like a Scion (the old Gen. X approach.) Still, no one bought the Paseo (as illustrated.)
I guess you had to see it in person, but nobody would have mistaken the Paseo for a Camry-sized vehicle. I remember when these came out, and the issue with them (back before we said “issues” instead of problems) was that they were tiny and gutless. I never even attempted to test drive one, because there was no doubt that the 1.5l engine was going to disappoint.
Where I live, the Paseo was briefly popular as a cheap, sporty-looking car that made a good sweet 16 present for affluent teenagers. At least for a year or two until the Hyundai Scoupe turbo ate its lunch.
I feel like the styling was set by where the Cynos fit into the Japanese market, more than the very, very US-centric XV20 Camry. Keep in mind, the Cynos/Paseo was sold all around the world, in many areas along with the V30 and V40 Camry, instead of the XV widebody Camry developed primarily for North America. In that context, its styling makes sense. Any relation to the XV40 was mostly by virtue of the fact that they were styled along with that generation of low-/mid-market Toyota production. The first generation had basically used Celica/MR2 cues in a smaller, more notchback-like profile. The second gen was a mashup of Carina/eD/Corona/Camry/Mark II/Corolla cues on the same body.
This is very much the case. These actually mirror the JDM Corolla Levin/Trueno coupe twins of the time, with a slight fastback. The US market was still obviously a consideration, but Japan’s economic situation between the first generation and second was radically changing, and the entire Toyota lineup was reflecting that by 1995. My post below goes into further detail regarding the Cynos. For reference, compare this Paseo to the 1995 Trueno:
You beat me to it.
I used to own a AE111 Levin, which for those who don’t know looks the same as the the image in your post but with a grille of sorts.
The Levins were a grey import here and so most people did not know what they were. I had a few people confuse it with the Paseo 🙁 which wasn’t very flattering as the Levin was a much more capable car. It was the AE111 Levin they should have sold here, NOT the Paseo.
I’m surprised that Toyota OZ even bothered tp sell the Paseo here (even electing to including the JDM style rear wiper) given their historical distaste for coupes (even bad/average ones like the Paseo) in favour of yet another so called “sports” utility vehicle.
Having said that back in the day, one did see a few on the road. They didn’t seem to age well and I get the impression they were built in Toyota’s C grade assembly plant and they all seemed to acquire faded paint and rust, nothing like the long standing high level of durability of fully imported Toyotas sold in Australia.
Yet again, the big problem with the second generation Paseo (Cynos in Japan) was the Dollar to Yen exchange rate. These were not only decontented from the first generation, but were significantly pricier. The first generation was actually fairly spy for the class if you optioned the wide for the times 185/60/14 alloy wheels. Early cars also had a more powerful version of the 5E-FE good for 100 hp. In Japan, this Cynos could be had with Toyota’s TEMS suspension (Toyota Electronically Modulated Suspention) and the high output 5E-FHE motor, along with other options like auto climate control and a high performance 7-speaker stereo. They were definitely in a different market position at home than what us in North America and Australia received. That all changed with the introduction of the second generation. Japan’s bubble economy popped while this model was being developed, and the resulting product was moved downmarket in Japan and fairly well matched the world market cars. The 5E-FHE was gone, TEMS was gone, the luxury touches gone. Japan even introduced a 1.3 4E-FE in hopes to maintain market share (and it became the bigger seller there). The US cars had cheaper materials, but weren’t exactly cheap cars, and that’s why they failed. The same fate hit the Tercel; too pricey relative to what you could get elsewhere (or a NUMMI Corolla). Big evidence of this problem shows up in the replacement Echo; designed to be cheaper but at the expense of feature content. Power windows weren’t even optional on the early Echo.
I had completely forgotten about this restyle of the Paseo. If you had told me the Paseo looked the same all the way to the bitter end, I’d have believed you.
Now that you pointed out the resemblance to the Camry, I can see why it’s so forgettable.
I always wondered, if the Paseo was the answer, what was the question?
The Paseo reminds me of Ford’s EXP, which likewise offered no advantage over the Escort. The Dodge 024 looked better, but it didn’t sell well either.
I think only VW got away with this game, in the Scirocco.
That and the Honda CRX which was very popular and is still beloved.
I never noticed there were two generations of Paseo. Can’t recall what the other one looked like. Too blah to be bothered Googling it. Toyota.
I’ve never seen the second gen Paseo, but do remember the first. Always thought they were aimed at single women (or rather women with no kids). Slightly more stylish than a similar sized sedan of the times, kind of cute, very un-masculine in outlook – does not scream power. Something like the Honda CR-Z today I guess – sporty-ish, hugely impractical for anyone with kids, and somehow feminine in their styling.
I owned a black 1997 Paseo Convertible, purchased for the princely sum of $800.
I will say here that it was one of the most fun vehicles I’ve ever had, and perhaps the embodiment of “more fun to drive a slow car fast.” The convertible equipment (which was manually operated) only added about 200 pounds and performance was what I described as peppy, even with the automatic.
I also strangely got a lot of attention, more than with any other car I’ve owned. i would frequently get people asking “Is that a Paseo convertible? I haven’t seen one in years!”
The interior was lifted out of the Tercel (and all that that implies) but became more livable when I added a 12 inch subwoofer that ate up the tiny trunk space.
The convertibles were modified in the U.S (possibly Long Beach, CA) by ASC and were sold in Japan but were an extremely limited run of I believe 1200 cars.
A Hyundai shopper went in see the Excel and discovered they could have a Tiburon instead. That is why the Tiburon sold – those buyers thought they could only afford an Excel, but discovered a much more exciting car they could afford.
Come in to price an Excel, and then leave in a Tiburon! WINNER!
A Toyota shopper went in to see a Camry or Celica and discovered they could afford a Paseo instead. That is why the Paseo didn’t sell – those buyers thought they could afford a better car, but discovered that they could only get a dull knock off.
No one wanted to come in to price a Celica, and then leave in a Paseo. LOSER CAR.
Obviously Toyota knew this, so it tried to style their loser car like the cars their buyers were coming in to shop.
No one wants to go to grandma’s house for dinner, then discover she heated up two Banquet pot pies.
With a few rare exceptions, Toyota just doesn’t do sporty. I mean take the Solara. A woman I worked with bought one when they came out, loved it, but she was not a sporty car driver. My wife had to tell me it was supposed to be sporty. 2 doors doesn’t mean sporty, it just means 2 doors not 4. So why should the Paseo be any different? People buy Toyotas because they want something that won’t break, and Toyota indeed has the best reputation for reliability. Styling? Well, everyone’s tastes are different, but I see them as boring but inoffensive. Occasionally a real turkey will slip out, but mostly they’re exciting when new because they’re new and shinny, not because of how they are shaped or fun to drive. Point A to point B with as little drama as possible.
To answer the very first introductory question: Because the first gen Solara looked not so bad , less worse than the second gen which looked like a big turtle.
Toyota mastered inoffensive generic styling around this time.