The sale of the Supra supports the American Heart Association (AHA) and the Bob Woodruff Foundation (BWF)
Unveiled last Monday at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, the 2020 Toyota Supra will go on sale this summer. We don’t have an exact production number set yet, but we do know that the first model was sold yesterday at Barrett-Jackson for over 2 millions dollars.
Certainly being a charity car, and the first of its kind drove up the price, but this is still a shocking amount of money for the new Supra, even one of the 1,500 Launch Edition models. The Launch Edition Supras have a base price of 56,180$. That means this first Supra cost over 37 times the price of, say, the second or third examples. Thankfully this isn’t simply some display of vulgar opulence, as 100% of this astonishing price for this car was donated to the American Heart Association and the Bob Woodruff Foundation to support veterans and service members.
The fact of the matter is, the person who bid this car up sky high at Barrett-Jackson is getting a huge tax deduction for the privilege. Also, the winning bidder received a full VIP race track experience that includes a fully customized professional racing suit, two VIP passes and hot passes to TOYOTA OWNERS 400 – Richmond Raceway and a chance to drive the pace car and do hot laps with Michael Waltrip.
Toyota Supra should be fairly priced but with different styling for the mass market
While this event might determine some Toyota dealers to add an edge and make some price adjustments accordingly, MKV Supra the car is not a limited production vehicle – outside of the limited-to-90 GR Supra – and should level out once those willing to pay the markup get their cars.
The regular Supra will sell for quite a bit less than this one just managed. The “regular” Supra starts at just 49.990$, with Launch Edition models kicking off at 55.250$.
Interestingly, however, the first Toyota Supra is a one-of-one in a special color. It’s a matte grey with red mirror caps, matte black wheels, and a bright red interior. The engine compartment has been signed by Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda, and just to tick the bid over a little more, he included the race shoes, suit, gloves, and helmet used to complete the final test of the Supra before signing off on production.
Supra fans still have a chance to get a 2020 model with almost the same stylings as the auction car. Toyota will be releasing 1,500 Launch Edition Supras in the US, and while they won’t have the matte gray exterior, they do come with the red mirrors, black wheels, and a reproduction of the CEO’s signature on the dashboard. These limited edition models have a starting price of roughly $56,000, which is much, much easier to swallow than $2.1 million.
These kinds of charity sales are not indicative of the invisible hand of the market dictating the car’s value. These are headline-creating attention-grabbing charity donations that probably do more to help these individual foundations than an anonymous donation of the same amount would, because it helps provide awareness for regular folks when it comes time to decide who they will donate to.
Don’t worry about having to pay huge sums for these cars, they’re not “worth” any more because of a charity auction result. If Jeeps were magically worth $1.3 million all of a sudden, David Tracy would be buying everyone at the club a round of tall glasses of their finest milk.
