Design and development

By the time the production of the original FJ40 ended in 1984, Toyota had shifted towards increasing the size and luxury of the Land Cruiser line. The idea of a new FJ with rugged capabilities of the FJ40 originated in the mid 1990s with Toyota Product Planner Dave Danzer and then Vice President of Sales and Operations Yoshi Inaba.^[10]
Danzer worked secretly with Akio Toyoda to set up a special shop at the NUMMI plant to test the feasibility of a new FJ40 by combining Tacoma underpinnings with the bodies of Toyota Bandeirante, an FJ40 based vehicle still in production in Brazil (as a diesel model only) at the time.^[11] Akio Toyoda returned to Japan to join the board of directors giving high level support to the project. Toyota's flagship design studio Calty was then brought on to deliver a fresh interpretation of the FJ40.^[12]
Calty hired veteran Chrysler automotive designer Bill Chergosky to lead the development of an offroad vehicle known internally as Rugged Youth Utility (RYU) aimed at attracting young male buyers, a segment Toyota felt they were losing touch with at the time.^[13] Many takes on the RYU concept were created including the 2001 Rugged Sports Coupe concept before a retro style design created by 24-year-old designer Jin Won Kim was chosen as the final exterior concept with Chergosky designing the interior.^[14][15]
The FJ Cruiser concept debuted at the 2003 Detroit Auto Show in Voodoo Blue, a color that would become the Signature color for the production FJ Cruiser.^[16] The bold styling was an immediate hit with the automotive press and general public despite competing with more exotic concepts like the Cadillac Sixteen and Dodge Tomahawk.^[17] By resurrecting design traits from the iconic FJ40, the FJ Cruiser was viewed as a new "Halo Car" for Toyota much like the similarly retro styled 2005 Mustang had done for Ford.
In the summer of 2004, Toyota began extensive off road evaluations of the FJ platform by driving development mules on many of the most difficult trails in North America including Moab, Utah, the Angeles National Forest, the Mojave Desert, and the famed Rubicon Trail. Despite each one off mule costing hundreds of thousands of dollars, the development team was determined to push the capabilities of the prototypes in order to deliver reliable off road performance in the production model. Changes to the A-TRAC traction control system and suspension tuning came as a direct result of the prototype testing.^[18]
The exterior of the FJ concept remained largely unchanged when the final production model debuted at the 2005 North American International Auto Show. However, Chief production engineer Akio Nishimura had to significantly alter the amenities offered in Chergosky's interior concept to keep the price of the production FJ Cruiser reasonable. Unique interior touches like the gear shifter that doubled as a shovel handle, removable interior lights which doubled as flashlights, and flat folding front seats were removed though several concept items remained as factory options.^[19]