November: 13th - Honeydew Toyota 27th
- Halfway Fourways
December: 12th - Halfway
Scottburgh
The History of Halfway Toyota... Before and up to 1947, the town of Umzinto was the centre of the mid South Coast. There were no coastal roads and double-lane highways around back then, nor even dreamt of. A trip from Port Shepstone to Durban was quite an outing, with the only route winding through Umzinto along sandy tracks towards Illovo where the tarmac eventually began.
Between Umzinto and Scottburgh, the route wandered its way down to the coast at Park Rynie, where Saunders Garage was located. The business was sold to Murray and Daddy of Umzinto and in 1965 the directors of Marray and Daddy - A.M. Edwards, G.B. Payne and J.G. Baikie (Snr) changed Sauders Garage to Halfway Service Station. This name was chosen because the service station was roughly the halfway mark between Port Shepstone and Durban.
Shortly after the name change an opportunity arose to purchase a relatively "unkown" and "untried" franchise of a new Japanese automaker named Toyota. The decision to invest in this franchise was a challenging and risky one, but Mr John Baikie (Snr) never regretted his decision, since Toyota grew from strength to strength into the reputable name it is today.
Eventually, Mr John Baikie (Snr) took over the running of Halfway Service Station, which incidently still stands on its origional site today. He saw an opportunity to buy out Halfway Toyota Park Rynie from his partners to become the sole owner. When John Baikie (Snr)'s son, George matriculated and had completed his compulsory military service, he began his apprenticeship at Scottburgh Motors before moving across to Halfway Toyota. It was here that George first dived into the admin and sales divisions, before completely taking over the business from his father.
The business has expanded considerably since then with Halfway Toyota Dealerships now including Widenham, Howick, Port Shepstone, Uvongo and Halfway Toyota Fourways in Johannesburg. The Halfway Toyota group gained presence in Johannesburg in Fourways when an existing dealership, Bryanston Toyota was aquired. It changed its name to became Halfway Toyota Fourways in 2000 and has subsequently become one of the flagship Toyota dealerships in South Africa.
Towards the latter part of 2008, Halfway Toyota purchased of Honeydew Toyota in Johannesburg. In March 2009, Halfway Uvongo and Halfway Port Shepstone amalgamated to form Halfway Toyota Shelly Beach. This new venture has been modelled on Toyota's Global franchise standards.
To provide a further service all of Halfway's Toyota's dealerships, Scottfin Insurance Brokers form part of the Halfway group and help to finance the sale of vehicles.
