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“A Class Apart”
The car was coasting along beautifully at 120 Kmph as I snatched fourth and slammed the throttle to listen to the gruff German exhaust burble one more time. The nicely weighted electromechanical steering responded with willingness of a hungry German shepherd, presented with KFC’s best as I slammed on the brakes and scrubbed off residual excess speed to hit the right apex, all the while fervently hoping that dreaded tread shuffle would not develop into terminal under steer. It didn’t. There was a spot of squirreling as I downshifted to second and unleashed the entire wave of torque that the creamy Mercedes in line four turbo petrol could throw out at the fat 225 section front tires.
One more up shift using the paddle shifters on the 7 speed DCT and within no time the speedo nudged the ton mark again. TAI’s first review of a Mercedes was going as smoothly as it could and Janis Joplin was belching her famous “Oh Lord won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz……” on the stereo. And that’s when the cow decided to appear. Bang in the middle of a National Highway. In the broad daylight. Out of nowhere. Chewing cud. Blissfully. Not caring whether it’s a Mercedes or a mosquito that would hit it in a matter of seconds. Maybe it believed in God and destiny. Achtung baby!
Holy Cow! As I swore, slammed on the brakes, and yanked the steering to the right at 110 kmph to avoid the inevitable collision, I could almost hear the bovine looking at the A-Class and mumbling “Volvo, eh?” For an instant that felt like an eternity, my brain flash-backed to the year 1997 when the first A-Class (W168) had rolled over while being subjected to the Moose test by Swedish auto testers. This was 2013; here was the new A-Class. The cow was the Moose. Iron Rock was the Swedish (err Pune’ish) auto tester. And for those who came in late, ‘Volvo’ is Latin for “I roll”. The ABS went berserk, the ESP light went into Bhappi Lahiri mode, the tires yawned, the monocoque swerved and the A-Class came to a sure, safe halt. No twitching, no drama, no shimmy, and certainly no roll. It. Just. Stopped. This was 2013. Welcome to the new Mercedes Benz A Class (W176).
The first A-Class was born way back in 1997 when Mercedes Benz decided to offer an entry level car for the hoi polloi. A humble (by Mercedes standards) five door hatchback with power going to the front wheels. Exactly 111 years after Karl Benz got his first petrol engine up and running. As a manufacturer with zero experience in building small cars, it was a bold move by the German automaker to expand their product line, something that was necessary in order to bring more volumes in the cash starved 1990s and to combat the growing threat from the other two German marquees: BMW and Audi. The W168 was reasonably successful and more than a million units were sold during its eight year life cycle despite the Moose test debacle, which cost the company a massive DM 300 million to fix – ESP was added and the suspension suitably modified to arrest the tendency of flipping over due to the high center of gravity.
Year 2004 witnessed the launch of second generation A-Class (W169) that was also introduced in 3 door hatchback body style along with the 5 door hatchback version. It carried forward the tall boy architecture of the W168, although with its A pillars raked a bit more than the ones on erstwhile model (look closely and it seems as if the B-Class has morphed out of the W169). The front engine, front wheel drive layout was retained. Indeed, all Mercedes models that slot below the C-Class have a front engine, front wheel drive layout. The W169 also sold more than a million units till Mercedes decided that they need something ‘more’ from the next A-Class in order to achieve their sales target of 1.6 million cars in year 2015 and more than 2 million cars in year 2020.
Cut to end 2012 when Mercedes Benz had to be content with having sold only 1.32 million cars with the three pointed star on bonnet while BMW sold 1.54 million units and Audi sold 1.45 million cars. To add supercharged fuel to the fire, Merc’s sales grew less than 5% from the previous year’s sales figure (2011) while BMW and Audi both registered more than 11% growth in corresponding sales. “Zis iz not going ze way vi want it to,” said the men in white coats at Stuttgart and California, “letz teach zese guys a lezzon.” And as a result of this, the latest A-Class (W176) has both the BMW 1 Series and the Audi A1 firmly in its cross-hairs.
Mercedes’ problem has always been that its cars have found it tough to attract the attention of the young hip hop crowd with increasingly swelling pockets. Consequently, when it came to building the new A–Class, the think tanks at Stuttgart ditched their flip charts and ze zetailed prezentations and decided to take the hatchback competition head on. “Ze young crowd hav to like our A-Klasse. Yes they hav to like eet.” The legacy of the original design was ditched in favor of a more modern, youthful approach in order to open up new markets such as China and the US.
The idea was simple, catch them young and offer them something to graduate up to as they move up in the food chain. Accordingly, the Concept A-Class was shown to public in 2011 at the Shanghai Auto Show and the production model largely kept in sync with the concept, albeit with a few changes here and there. With the number of premium compact cars sold around the world rising every year and the W176 having already garnered more than 100,000 orders globally, Mercedes-Benz has high hopes from the current generation A-Class, which they have now decided to bring to India as well. “Ci meester, vi told you, zis wud sell.”
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