TOYOTA, INC. A Case Study in Communicating Bad News
Written by: Alex Mezey Scott Hamilton Kevin Kuwahara Courtney Sandlin
Dr. Robyn Walker Faculty Advisor Center for Management Communication

Prepared for:
Case Study Initiative Center for Management Communication 2013

Page 1 of 12

INTRODUCTION In 2005, Lupe Lee bought a new Toyota Camry from a local Sunnyvale, California, Toyota dealership, donating her immaculate Camry bought in 1990 to a local charity. Going from an older Camry model to a newer one, it was obvious that Lupe not only liked Camry cars, but she liked Toyota and its business model. However, this was all about to change on September 9, 2011. On this day, Lupe and her daughter were on their way to Berkeley for a niece’s wedding. They planned to stop in Burlingame to pick up Lupe’s sister, Rose. They arrived at the sister’s apartment early, so Lupe and her daughter went inside. After visiting in the apartment for a time, the three of them went out to get into the Camry to continue on to Berkeley. Lupe would have to make a U-turn to head back towards the freeway. Instead, she decided to maneuver into a nearby driveway to turn around. This is when things began to go horribly wrong; as they started up the driveway, the car began accelerating. Rose exclaimed “Lupe! What are you doing!? Why are you going so fast!? Push on the brake!” Lupe had no control of the car; she was terrified. She tried desperately to press the brake, but nothing happened. She quickly realized that the car mat had been lodged under the gas pedal forcing the car to accelerate and making it impossible for her to slow down. Her Camry crashed through the garage doors at the end of the drive, and Lupe had to think quickly about what to do next (reference Exhibit A for the crash visual). She knew that if she kept going straight, she could go through the wall into someone’s