Toyota's Tundra lottery! Why you REALLY want to be one of the first 300 Aussie drivers of the brand's Ram 1500 and Ford F-150-fighting mega ute

Toyota will use the first 300 owners of its incoming Tundra pickup truck as a kind of testing fleet to help it perfect its localisation program before the jumbo ute goes on Australia-wide sale.

It means buyer number 301 of the brand's Ford F-150 and Ram 1500-rivalling mega truck will be "perfect".

"When the person buys the 301st Tundra, it's going to be perfect. It'll be as good as factory right-hand-drive spec as you can get," says Toyota Australia's vice-president of sales and marketing, Sean Hanley.

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But what does that mean for the first 300 owners? They'll be expected to report back to Toyota with regular updates on their life with the Tundra, and Toyota knows it will have to make it worth their – or your – while.

Asked whether that mean discounts off the purchase price, Mr Hanley said the brand was still "working through" the details, but conceded the brand would rely on the help the early adopters offered.

"We're working through that at the moment, but part of our requirement for customers will be to report to us, to come to forums, to give us access to the vehicles," he said.

"So there are a lot of requirements of the 300. So we have to work around that, because the 300 people will also help.

"We want them to tell us over the foreseeable, how are they going? How are they performing? Are there any issues we need to know about? 

"This is exactly what Toyota quality is about. This is the first time we've ever done something like this inside of Toyota."

While Toyota won't be drawn on how they'll entice the customers to act as a testing bed, the brand says finding them won't be a problem. The real issue, Mr Hanley says, is ensuring they represent all walks of Australian life.

"What we've said was that we'd put 300 vehicles on the road later this year, in the fourth quarter. We'll deploy 300 vehicles around Australia as part of the final validation stage of that program," Mr Hanley says.

The Tundra program will begin in the fourth quarter of this year.

"We'll have more to say about the Tundra throughout 2023 obviously. But how we select those 300 customers will be determined closer to the first half (of the year).

"But we do know that the 300 customers will have to have a diverse range of motoring use."

That means, to be one of the first Tundra owners in Australia, you don't need to just be someone towing a caravan, or heading off-road, or living on a property. Toyota says it's keen to get feedback everywhere from the city to the bush.

"I'll say this, moving 300 of these in customer's hands won't be a problem," Mr Hanley says. 

"I'm more worried about getting them into the right hands, with the right diverse conditions, so we can get the best quality reports we can get."

The Tundra program will begin in the fourth quarter of this year, ahead of an expected full-scale rollout in late 2024. Toyota's most powerful vehicle, the Tundra powered by a 3.5-litre twin-turbo petrol V6 with hybrid assistance, which in US-spec Tundras, pushes out 286kW/650Nm.