What’s under the hood?

Posted on March 30, 2007 by S Running
Design

My wife and I were driving our 2000 Mercedes SUV to the beach last summer. For some reason, our conversation turned to whether or not we should be looking to replace our aging family truckster with a new car. She felt that a new car would be more reliable, while I wanted to keep our car. During the middle of our discussion, I opened the sunroof (something we’ve only used about 10 times) to the of sound cracking metal. A large piece of the sunroof assembly popped out and fell into the car. While holding a mangled sunroof wind deflector, she said “do you really want to keep this car?” Is it so wrong that I still like our Mercedes?

A few years back, Daimler-Chrysler merged with the idea that two massive companies could leverage each other’s technology, engineering and production techniques to gain efficiencies and save money. Despite a few successes, the Chrysler brand has continued to struggle.

What went wrong? I’m sure a number of things, but I’ll focus on one: Daimler is fiercely protective of the Mercedes brand. As a customer, I have to support them on this.

This protection translated to a reluctance to share Mercedes technology with Chrysler. How are Mercedes SLK 320 buyers going to feel paying $10-30K more than a Chrysler Crossfire, when the cars are very similar under the hood? Daimler believes that Mercedes buyers would catch on to this and, although they probably won’t start buying Chryslers, they may opt for another luxury class car (BMW).

Daimler-Chrysler found themselves between a rock and a hard place. Do they dilute their Mercedes brand to sell more Chryslers, or protect the integrity of Mercedes at the expense of losing Chrysler? At this point, the question is rhetorical as Chrysler is very close to being sold.

I appreciate that Daimler stuck by Mercedes. You can’t stick a Bentley logo on a Yugo and call it a Bentley—I guess you could do it once, but that would be the end of Bentley. Where do you draw the line? What if the Yugo engine and chassis are made by Bentley—can you call it a Bentley then? The Crossfire is supposed to be 39% Mercedes—is that enough? I’m not sure, but I can say that if the logo were the only thing that mattered, then car buying would be much easier: Pick whatever car you want, pick a color, and pick a logo. Or, just keep your current car and slap a new logo on it.

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