Honda recall paints troubling picture for car maker

If you’re going to have a bad week, it’s better to have it amid a jam-packed news cycle, but no amount of headlines elsewhere can mask the wretched week Japanese automakers are now enduring.

On Thursday came word that Honda is recalling 20,000 vehicles in Canada, part of a North American-wide effort encompassing up to 225,000 SUVs and minivans. The problem, says Honda, is with a safety feature within the automatic shifter that’s supposed to stop drivers from moving out of park without a foot on the brake.

So far there have been no injuries or damage reported, save, of course, for the reputation of Honda. It was only on last week that Honda joined four other automakers in pulling 3.4 million cars off the road to fix a problem with airbags. More than half of the recalled vehicles are Hondas, equipped with airbags that threaten to deploy with too much pressure, potentially exploding and sending out plastic shards. The airbags, supplied by Tokyo-based Takata Corp, are believed to have to caused one fatality already, according to reports.

Of those 3.4 million, 1.1 million of which are Hondas, second only to the 1.7 million Toyotas now being fixed. Forever the bridesmaid, there’s a certain symmetry to Honda’s runner-up status in the recall department. The company has long chased its national rival for market share. Last year, Honda finished well-behind in the global sweepstakes, selling 3.82 million cars and trucks, scarcely one-third of Toyota’s world-beating 9.75 million-vehicle bonanza.

Indeed, Honda ranked 14^th on the list of best-selling cars in 2012, with its Civic coming in behind three Toyotas, a Nissan and a bunch of Fords. (Toyota’s Corolla with 1m sales narrowly beat out the Ford Focus for the top spot).

In fairness, Honda fared better in Canada, producing not only the best-selling car in the Civic, for the 15^th straight year but coming in 5^th amongst all automakers in sales.

It’s for that reason that this week’s news must be particularly troubling, as Canada represents one of the few countries where Honda has achieved showroom supremacy. It’s obviously too early to know whether two massive recalls in two weeks will significantly dent sales, particularly with the latter not involving Civics, yet it’s certainly not too soon to see comparisons emerging between these glitches and the escalating series of problems that have haunted Toyota in recent years, tarnishing its once vaunted reputation and seriously calling into question the company’s commitment to quality.

Honda too has had its share of issues lately, including a 30,000 vehicle recall of Accords in October, another 52,000 SUV and minivan problem in December, then a 7,800 recall of Pilots and Acuras in March.

Drip, drip, drip. So far, it’s been minor matters proactively tackled before any accidents happen. But if these issues aren’t addressed, it will be Honda in the headlines, and the story could be very bad indeed.