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Wagons Mercedes-Benz R-Class Mercedes-Benz R-Class
693 messages, Last post on Jan 19, 2008 at 9:07 AM
You are in the Mercedes-Benz R-Class Forum. Your Host is kcram
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Replying to: merc1 (May 16, 2006 10:21 pm) Now, I have looked at and driven the MB on several occasions. and yes i will buy an R500 as soon as it makes "sense." First observation - not getting rear seat DVD in the R from day one was the biggest blunder I have seen from a major automaker in recent history. Drive down I95 on the east coast and one out of four vehicles has DVD for the kids -forget income demographics. If a 4 yr old chrysler town and country minivan can have it, dont tell me my $60k MB cant. Doors. Find me a family with a late model odyssey/siena that doesnt treat remote opening doors and tailgate as a given. MB compounds the problem with some of the biggest doors i have even seen. I agree that staying away from sliding was the right thing to do to avoid stlying miscues, but couldnt they figure a way to open and maybe even shut them remotely??? certainly they could open by remote....Next up: space/storage. they dropped the ball more than a bit by not coming up with as much space behind the 3rd row as an odyssey. the space is almost nonexistent. and folding the 3rd row really doesnt create alot of space since the whole "deck" is high with the seats folded. really crappy MB. biggest disappointment in my mind and one that cant be fixed. oh well, we'll add our thule to the top for long trips with the family...Finally, the whole perceived value issue. MB has some cool options. no doubt. but they are expensive. and so not everyone wants them. sure i love self leveling xenons, and dropped $1200 for them in my porsche but i dont know that i 'd spring for them in the R.... and besides if they truly marketed this as an executive hauler or what was that one marketing campaign i saw - oh yeah, something like showing a vineyard owner hauling around migrant labor by day and then heading out with their 4 rich friends for dinner in napa at night. who in god's name came up with that one! - then they should have loaded on the options and tacked on a higher price as people with $250k incomes would accept and expect. But they didnt....it must be because they secretly didnt want to scare away some "entry level" minivan type buyers looking at the 350....so now they please noone! they arent really luring the core minivan buyers b/c it lacks practicality. execs and vineyard owners dont want to own what amounts to a minivan. so who is left??? the people who are willing to give up all that is great about the odyssey/sienna for style, cache, performance, handling, safety so as to be outside the ever growing minivan set. I ll be honest, and you can call me a snob, but i dont like my wife driving the same minivan that typical middle class moms are driving. i want a better vehicle. and there are alot of people who feel the same way. it is the reason i have many friends in their 30s/40s who suffer the impractical nature of ALL luxo SUVs when it comes to small children and the way they drive so they can avoid driving a pedestrian minivan. brand it by lexus or acura and they would buy it....it is only a dirty word because it screams middle class....why is it that ford sold the crap out of the explorer and Jeep with cherokee and so everybody jumped on board and started marketing SUVs. seeing a growing market that kept getting more competitive the foreign automakers took them upscale and guess what? people kept buying them. sienna/odyssey sales are flat. they are dropping the ball by not reinventing themselves in the luxo segment. seriously what would it cost to rebadge/repower/makeover an ody for acura?? or a sienna for lexus? well they havent done it and MB is 90% and did it from scratch. now they just need to perfect it and market it to the right group. and just stop trying to define a new category.....crossover luxo-people mover is not a freakin' category!!
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Replying to: irishrogue1 (Jun 07, 2006 2:25 pm)
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Replying to: irishrogue1 (Jun 07, 2006 2:33 pm) If Mercedes would advertise on TV as much as they advertise for the new GL, maybe they might sell more.
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Replying to: templeton3 (Jun 07, 2006 2:53 pm) |
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Replying to: benzster (Apr 10, 2006 10:36 am) Sold us. 
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Replying to: ctsang (Apr 16, 2006 10:56 am) _____________________________________ No, I can't do that, but I'll go to Ethan allen and have them deliver. 
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Replying to: mbowers (Jun 08, 2006 6:52 am) |
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