Originally Posted by KI_GSE21

Hayden:

Nice to hear that you are in the marketing and branding sector.
I think with T1R, consumer's perception is one of the areas for improvement. T1R is actually not a Japan company. To clarify, it is an in-house brand of AJ Racing (one of our vendors). Most of their parts are either made in Japan, Taiwan or China. However, their quality expectations are very high and will only source them to reputable manufacturers overseas. Perhaps T1R has to build a stronger brand image in the minds of consumers because T1R offers very good products that many are unaware of.

For Tanabe, they were very popular many years ago. They are still quite popular in Norh America now but not in Japan. In the tuning arena in Japan, Tanabe is not very highly sought after. This is mainly their lack of involvement in racing and heavy tuning. Their success in North America is mainly due to popularity of their products, such as suspension and exhaust systems. Their products aren't very aggressive in nature, unlike T1R, HKS, etc who care about performance and sound for exhaust systems. For Tanabe, they advertise based on their db levels and again conservative setups. Definitely not a tuner's choice, but probably for those who just wants to go aftermarket. Their suspension (coilovers) aren't the best either. They have softer spring rates and twin tube setups where comfort is emphasized. This is same for their springs, which has the softest spring rates among other competing offerings like Espelir, Eibach, etc.
I personally won't buy any Tanabe products because they do not have the involvement on the track and engineering in their products. I would say their products are just mediocre.

For Fujitsubo, they are very dominant in Japan and have relatively strong bargaining power. Their offer sport exhaust upgrades to dealerships and are highly recognized for their quality and wide product line-up. They have both conservative exhaust upgrades to more aggressive ones with larger piping diameter. Given their many years of experience and focus on exhaust tuning, they are one of the most experienced companies in Japan when it comes to exhaust systems. Very high quality and they actually dyno most of ther systems, post it online with a graph and sometimes accompanied with a soundclip. However, Fujitsubo is not very popular in North America and many think their products are priced at a premium. However, you are really getting a quality product from a reputable company. In the recent years, Fujitsubo products are offered by TEIN USA and they are entering into the North American market and distributed by TEIN USA, who has quote strong distribution channels already established.

For BuddyClub, their products are mainly made in Taiwan now. They used to be quite involved in racing and what not. However, they are not as popular right now because they have fallen behind and are not offering as many new products as before. Their products, however, tend to be one the slightly cheaper side in terms of quality. Owners using their race headers have experiencing cracks and poor welding. Therefore, BuddyClub is an "okay" company but it is not very forward moving.

For Honda tuning, I would look at Spoon, HondaTwinCam, Mugen, Noblesse, Toda Racing, Maxim Works (header applications) who are all very well known in Japan.

PS.
I am actually Chinese and I am in Canada. My location is Japan because I really admire Japanese automobiles.