Why does a Nissan Skyline have the 'Skyline' badge on the back written in English rather than Japanese?

Answer 1

All Nissan models have western character and names. Skyline, Bluebird, Sunny, Primera, Fairlady, Silvia and so on.

Answer 2

The word "Skyline" is an English word.
Because the Japanese language is based on fixed syllable sounds, rather than fixed letter sounds (as in all European languages), with characters representing syllables, there isn't an easy way to write "Skyline" in Japanese.
Also, by writing the names in English (or French, or Italian), the Japanese manufacturers can appear more international, more exotic to the Japanese buyer.
Furthermore, if the same model is sold in other countries, it cuts cost and assembly complication by only having one badge. I think the badge on some Skylines was moulded into a rear panel, so the tooling cost for another panel with different characters would be very high (many millions of yen).

The Korean manufacturers also use Roman lettering on their cars in their home market. However, some Chinese manufacturers do use Chinese lettering on their cars for their domestic market.

Answer 3

In Japan they use English bagging just like other counties do, but some of their cars are called different things like the 240SX is the or Silvia, the IS300 is the Alteza, the RSX is still an Integra, there is no Acura, Lexus or Infinity they are just Honda, Toyota, and Nissan, which almost all the high end brands go by numbers here in the US but Japan almost all their cars are done by names. Since only a fraction of the cars they make stay in Japan they use English since the most common places they are sending the cars are familiar or speak English US, UK, Australia to name just a few.

Answer 4

All automakers badge their vehicles in English or Alphanumeric. They do this because all of their vehicles are being marketed to different countries. Also, it's financially unsound to spend large sums of money to have badges made in different languages (i.e. Japanese, Chinese, etc..). Automakers badge their cars to be easily recognizable in certain countires (i.e. Infiniti G35 (US) = Nissan V35/Skyline (JPN) ; Acura RSX (US) = Honda Integra (JPN)).

No one outside of the "car circles" knew that Corolla = Hachiroku or 240SX = Silvia or 240/280Z/300Z/350Z = Fairlady Z until movies like The Fast and The Furious came out.

It's all about the money.

Answer 5

I was told in my modern Japanese class
English is writen on the cars in Japan because it looks faster.
Also think about it if you saw a 2 inch box and all would you be able to read it from 150 feet back.

Also when i was stationed there they would write about 50 lines of text and it would almost be understandable.

Answer 6

all car companies usually have badges written in roman style letters so everyone can identify what it is
if it was in japanese then only those that could read japanese would be able to know what kind of car it was

Answer 7

Because the Japanese think things written in English is hip, cool and trendy.

It may be, but they really need to get someone who understands English to read it first.

Some of their attempts at cool slogans are downright embarrasing!

Answer 8

Maybe it's only like that in English speaking countries? Could you read Japanese?

Answer 9

Simple. It depends where it sell.
It sounds more local and that help to increase the sale of the car.

Answer 10

Why would it have to be in Japanese.....? I don't think I've seen any cars with such badges in years.