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Toyota to shift some Tacoma output to Texas from Mexico
$3 billion San Antonio plant investment will add a production line and 2,000 jobs
Key Takeaways:
- Toyota said July 6 it will move some Tacoma production from Mexico to San Antonio as part of a $3.6 billion Texas investment.
- The expansion will add about 2,000 jobs by 2030 and raise San Antonio’s annual capacity by 150,000 vehicles, Toyota said.
- Toyota said its central Mexico Tacoma plant will continue U.S. exports, while the Tijuana factory’s replacement product remains unclear.
Toyota Motor Corp. is moving some of the production of its popular Tacoma midsize truck from a plant in Mexico to San Antonio as part of a $3.6 billion investment in the Texas facility.
The Japanese carmaker will build a second production line in San Antonio, where it currently makes full-size pickups and SUVs, and add some 2,000 new jobs by 2030, it said July 6.
The shift, following Toyota’s pledge last year to spend $10 billion on its U.S. manufacturing operations over the next decade, comes as talks between the U.S. and Mexico to renew a North American free trade agreement have stalled. President Donald Trump, who has pressed Toyota to invest more in the U.S., let a July 1 deadline pass without a trade pact extension.
The world’s largest automaker is on track to potentially overtake General Motors Co. in terms of U.S. new car sales volume later this year.
“By expanding our San Antonio plant, we are deepening our commitment to American manufacturing,” Ted Ogawa, president of Toyota Motor North America, said in a statement.
RELATED: Toyota to Invest Further $1B to Boost Output at U.S. Plants
The Tacoma, or “Taco” to truck enthusiasts, is the best-selling midsize pickup in the U.S. and has been made at two plants in Mexico. It's unclear what product will backfill the lost production at the factory near Tijuana, which last year built some 166,653 Tacoma models. A company spokesman said Toyota had nothing further to share at this time.
The other plant that makes Tacomas, which is located in central Mexico, will continue to export them to the U.S., the spokesman said.
By moving some production of its best-selling truck to Texas, Toyota will shield itself from the impact of tariffs on Mexican imports. Autos shipped from Mexico are subject to U.S. duties as high as 25%, which has hit Toyota and other automakers’ bottom lines and upended decades of cross-border production planning.
The expansion in San Antonio, which is nearly twice as large as had been anticipated, will double the size of the plant to about 5 million square feet. And it will bring Toyota’s total spending at the site to $8.3 billion since it broke ground there 23 years ago.
“This Texas-sized investment reflects the strength of our workforce and the unmatched business advantages found only in our state,” Gov. Greg Abbott said in the statement.
San Antonio is currently running near its full production capacity of around 200,000 vehicles a year, and the expansion will add another 150,000 vehicles annually, the spokesman said. The added output from 2030 will ramp up over a four-year period.
Toyota’s vow to boost spending was designed to blunt criticism from Trump and followed a trade deal between the U.S. and Japan. So far, those investments have included a $1 billion investment to increase output at plants in Indiana and Kentucky, as well as $912 million to lift production at facilities in five other U.S. states.
