Consumer Reports : test drive of 2012 LE 5 door w/ ...

[BluYrs]

The price issue CR has with the Yaris reminds me of the Citroen case here in Europe.

Citroen sells a variety of cars from electric cars through subcompact to middle class, SUV and MPVs. They are mostly very aggressively priced as new- either though massive discounts or near-interest-free financing. This means that the market is overflooded with Citroens, which are 3-5 years old and cost very little compared to other similar vehicles.

How can Citroen pull this off and still make any money? The key word is servicing. Typically, owners of near-new cars (up to, say, five years) opt for dealer services and also bring their cars to the dealer to have repairs made (which they, by all means, could have done at another place). As it also happens, Citroens aren't the most reliable cars, to put it mildly. Along with regular services, Citroen owners will thus have to have some repairs done.

So Citroen knows that they can sell their cars for even a loss, but they'll make up for it via servicing. This, however, is something that Toyota cannot do. For obvious reasons :)