-Avalon didn't make much sense over a camry for people on budget and those who had the cash would prefer the es.
-Crown on the other hand was a mini ls and a totally different car which could have been unique globally and may have given a tough time to the germans but with whatever they have done with the new crown it's not looking good from all the specs that have leaked it's clearly a downgrade and i just don't get who in their right minds would even consider this plastic kardashian-esque design over a camry (for regular sedan buyers that is).
-Crossover buyers who buy a toyota would probably go for lexus or venza or even the rav 4.
Guess we'll have to wait 4 more days for the verdict.
You make a good point (a few, really). In JDM when the Lexus brand was weaker, the Crown was historically seen as Toyota's answer to the E Class and 5 Series because it was a prestigious luxury product. I wonder if, since Lexus' own GS has failed and the sedan market has changed so drastically, it has Toyota thinking about a whole new formula for the Crown vs. trying to iterate on what it was before. Maybe so?
I'm just struggling to understand who this is supposed to serve when it's surrounded by the Camry, ES, Highlander, Venza, etc. on all sides but maybe we will know more this week once we see it. Months ago when the rumors pointed to the Crown becoming Toyota's "RX" (midsize, two row, way more comfort than the compact crossovers), it made a lot of sense to me, but trying to package that request into a sedan-liftback-CUV body style is going to be a hard sell here. I think most Americans will either go Camry, ES, Venza, NX or RX depending on price.
I'm also beginning to wonder if all of the "a Crown sedan, a Crown liftback, a Crown CUV" speculation was translation error and Toyota is actually going to weave all of them into one model vs. three different Crown models. That's certainly how it looks.