How to promote Mercedes C-Class to younger buyers

Hi,

I owns C180, previously owned E230. The C class, lot of problems inside, is not expensive comparing E model, but the quality is not so good. For young people, perhaps CLK or SLK may be attractive, but the C class is a sort of waste of money. If I buy, I would rather select BMW, or Mini or Japanese car or Hyundai Scope.

What do you think about it?

snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com (Designerd) haute in die Tasten:

Compared to a BMW 325i? Nothing. The BMW simply is the better car.

I would suggest thinking of people who are no car enthusiasts, but are aware of enviromental and economical issues. Maybe you could try to explain to them, that a Mercedes is made up to the highest enviromental standards possible, that it is very solid and features an extremely high safety standard. In Germany Mercedes once made a commercial for the old Mercedes 190E (W201), showing a baby sitting in its baby chair on the backseat of a Mercedes 190. The claim was: "Where would you like your child to be now else than in a Mercedes?"

Maybe one could get young buyers to buy a Mercedes by promising them that they do not have to worry about their car, when they ought to worry about their young career, their first own home, setting up a family etc.

In Germany we have a lot of attempts from Mercedes to approach young buyers. I have never met one who felt amazed by that. As a matter of fact, new Mercedes are way too expensive for young buyers, even if Christina Aguilera sings the commercial song. Maybe one should set up a certified perowned car program to bring the Mercedes experience to the less wealthy young people - and have them buy a new Mercedes in a few years.

Frank

In what country are you/is the campaign?

DAS

Put a bunch of loud woofers in it and a cradle for the ipod.

Don't focus on the nuts and bolts too much,, just try to show the car in "hip" young settings.

It's an expensive car, and older people tend to have more $.

Very insulting to knowledible automotive women everywhere.

Marty

In the days before the 190 it was objectively true that the average age of the Merc buyer was higher than that of the BMW buyer, simply because of the existence of cheaper BMW 3s.

The 190 (superseded by the C) gave access to cheaper Mercs. Then BMW came up with the 'low-end) Compact, and now Merc have the A-Class which is relatively low cost.

We still don't know where you are based or where this campaign is supposed to be or if you are just starting a discussion...

DAS

Designerd wrote: [...]

Bad idea. The C230 doesn't compare favorably with the 325i, except in one are: price--and the C230 sedan doesn't even have that advantage (it's roughly the same price as the 325i). The C230 coupe does have a price advantage over the 325i.

One area where the C-class has an advantage over the 3-series--at least in my city--is availability of base models and the willingness of the dealer to sell a base model. The BMW dealer I went to didn't have anything on the lot under $40,000 and wasn't interested in talking to me about a $30,000 car. The MB dealer had some C230 coupes on the lot and was more than happy to find me a car that had the configuration I wanted (the only options I purchased were the panoramic sunroof and the CD changer).

By default, BMW didn't have a chance to sell me a car because the dealer refused to offer one in my price range.

The C230 coupe is more likely to appeal to young buyers than the C230 sedan, IMHO. I'd concentrate on showing college-age or 20-something folks enjoying riding around with the panoramic sunroof open and the windows down and the stereo blaring.

BTW: Audio options are important to the youth market and to date, MB hasn't offered important ones, such as a CD player that can handle MP3 or WMA formatted music, or a connector to allow you to plug in your own MP3 player. Likewise, there's no factory option for satellite radio and MB's stereos generally don't have AUX inputs to permit adding aftermarket ones without resorting to an FM-transmitter hack.

--Paul

When the new C coupe was introduced here (in western Canada) a couple of years ago, DaimlerChrysler (or the local dealers, but more likely D-C) went around and put postcards in the 'free post card' racks in the kind of places where young, trendy, hip (hep?) people hang out. Usually these racks are filled with promos for new albums, upcoming concerts or night clubs, but these cards from D-C came in sets of three. On the 'front' side of the card was an interesting, eye-catching picture unconnected to anything automotive, but on the other side was a one third section of a picture of the new C coupe (in young and trendy limefrostgoldmetallic). Pick up one card, have a quick look at the flip side, and you could not help but pick up the other two, and get the whole picture of the whole car. Even (non-young and non-trendy) I went for it. It was a 'sticky' enough campaign that I still have the cards squirreled away somewhere. Didn't buy one of the cars, though.

John M. in a stodgy old '94 E320