10% price reduction Mercedes

bs2014

Interesting albeit radical approach to combat the Brexit affect by Mercedes. Out of all brands, I wouldnt have expected Mercedes to take such actions. Lets hope it pays off for them.

http://www.mercedes-benz.ie/content/ireland/mpc/mpc_ireland_website/enng/home_mpc/passengercars/home/new_cars/2017_News.html#_int_passengercars:home:module-teaser:2017_News

goochy

It seems irelands merc sales are catching up with audi and bmw going by a feature on o Flaherty group. Well up this year. Wish they would improve dealer network

coylemj

When Mercedes dealers started importing 161 cars from the UK, it was standing out a mile that there would be a knock-on effect on sales of new cars so that reduction makes sense.

The people you (almost) feel sorry for are those who bought new in the 1st half of this year, they have seen the value of their cars drop by several thousand thanks to the flood of imports from the UK, both by dealers and private owners.

goochy

Buying new prestige cars especially top of range these days makes no sense. Independents are selling the likes of i8 and 6 series gt . Range rover with small miles for huge discount . a certain dealer on the kylemore road has been selling nearly new imports with huge spec for a few years at low prices. Assume they are bought from main dealers as you wouldn't find these cars at auction ?

digiman

goochy wrote: »

Buying new prestige cars especially top of range these days makes no sense. Independents are selling the likes of i8 and 6 series gt . Range rover with small miles for huge discount . a certain dealer on the kylemore road has been selling nearly new imports with huge spec for a few years at low prices. Assume they are bought from main dealers as you wouldn't find these cars at auction ?

Which dealer is this?

goochy

Paul tobin, he has always been a dealer who prices cars to sell easily , hes not interested in cars sitting in stock for months. Remember he had an irish 09 jag xk for sale at keen price , a certain 4x4 dealer in ww bought it as soon as it was for sale . Obviously pumped up price and then had it for sale for about a year.
With the UK cars in order to sell keenly surely he doesn't just buy off main dealers?

RedorDead

If i had bought a new merc in the past 12-18 months i wouldnt be very impressed with the large hit the residual value of my car just took. Particularly E Class and GLE Class and S Class which will see price cuts of 5, 7 and 10k respectively!

Serious hits on the dealers used car stocks too. Madness from MDL.

goochy

Yes madness especially as they had good year in 2016, you don't expect this with prestige cars. Existing owners will be peeved , used values will fall and demo / used stock will be devalued .
bad management from mdl, how have they held onto the merc. Agency ?

mickdw

I've said this in another thread already but I think it's madness.
They could have offered the same cut via a zero percent finance offering.
That would appear to be a better option for numerous reasons.
Firstly, it would retain new and used values better than a price cut.
Secondly, buyers would feel alot better about the finance when not seeing a chunk added on for interest.
Thirdly, retaining the higher new price would mean gfv would remain untouched on pcp deals therefore a large chunk would be taken off the monthly payments if dropping the interest. Dropping the new price most likely means dropping the gfv somewhat meaning the benefit to pcp deals is more limited. Given that mercedes seem uncompetitive with bmw and audi in terms of monthly payments, they really could have done with going the other way.
Finally, going the price drop route leaves a sour taste in the mouths of recent customers which really can take the shine off a car ownership experience. Perhaps could hurt dealers holding large stock too

Eric Cartman

Should have just given away 10k of options or bumped up the standard to the next model. Selling the best spec'd luxury cars in the class would be just as much of a draw. 10k makes a lot of difference to the c or e class in spec world.

goochy

They also aren't saying how long it will run for , very strange . There has to be something strange going on here for them to do this. Like does it only apply to existing stock ? Are they trying to catch up on bmw and audi at any cost ?

coylemj

I suspect it was a panic reaction - second hand prices are dropping because of UK imports, that in turn is putting people off buying new when they can see people importing perfectly good 6 month old models from the UK and saving a packet. So if you're a Merc. salesman waiting for people to come in and order new 162 models, you're going to be very idle for the second half of 2016.

I looked at an E220 UK 161 import, the MSL sales guy told me that in two or three years time he would give me the same trade-in value on that model as if it had been bought new in Ireland - you can bet he wasn't saying that to his regular customers who did buy Irish models in the past 12 months.

It will be interesting to see what happens and if things go back to 'normal', will they discriminate against those cars in 2019 when it comes to trading in? The only vestige of it's UK provenance you're left with is the fact that it's flagged in the registration cert as an import and the speedo is in MPH.

mickdw

coylemj wrote: »

I suspect it was a panic reaction - second hand prices are dropping because of UK imports, that in turn is putting people off buying new when they can see people importing perfectly good 6 month old models from the UK and saving a packet. So if you're a Merc. salesman waiting for people to come in and order new 162 models, you're going to be very idle for the second half of 2016.

I looked at an E220 UK 161 import, the MSL sales guy told me that in two or three years time he would give me the same trade-in value on that model as if it had been bought new in Ireland - you can bet he wasn't saying that to his regular customers who did buy Irish models in the past 12 months.

It will be interesting to see what happens and if things go back to 'normal', will they discriminate against those cars in 2019 when it comes to trading in? The only vestige of it's UK provenance you're left with is the fact that it's flagged in the registration cert as an import and the speedo is in MPH.

Better pre reg a few and discount them that way to compete with uk.
I guess they are nowhere near competing with uk though.

Leonard Hofstadter

The official reason is the drop in sterling following on from Brexit, and the obvious attraction cheaper sterling has for Irish buyers.

I admire them for doing it, but I understand what the rest of ye are saying about people who bought the cars this year being unhappy, not to mention the fact that there are other ways of protecting yourself from a flood of UK imports. In any event, sterling has gone up a lot in the last two weeks, £1 was about €1.11 two weeks ago, but it's up to about €1.175 at the moment and is touching on €1.18. Not as good as the €1.40 mark it was on this time last year, but a big improvement on where they were at for Irish exporters. A strong euro is the last thing this country needs when sterling is so weak as the UK is such an important export market for Ireland, even though it obviously does have massive advantages when it comes to importing second hand cars and making sure that local sellers aren't ripping people off even more than they usually do.

gctest50

No no, they are so delighted with the frugal K-series 1.5-liter DCi in the A160 cdi , they've gone full Dacia :

development hack yesterday :

Sam Russell

I saw a shiny black 162Dxxxx Mercedes E class top spec parked outside my house yesterday. There was a sick parrot sitting in the driving seat.

mickdw

Sam Russell wrote: »

I saw a shiny black 162Dxxxx Mercedes E class top spec parked outside my house yesterday. There was a sick parrot sitting in the driving seat.

How do you know he didn't pay the reduced price and was just returning from a week in Vegas on the difference.

Sam Russell

mickdw wrote: »

How do you know he didn't pay the reduced price and was just returning from a week in Vegas on the difference.

It had CD plates.

maximum12

Sam Russell wrote: »

It had CD plates.

So his government is probably paying for the car and he doesn't give a ****e.

Sam Russell

maximum12 wrote: »

So his government is probably paying for the car and he doesn't give a ****e.

It was a very big Merc with blacked out windows. He might have been the chaufeur in which case why would he worry.

Also, I doubt that MSL wrote to customers who had very recently purchased a very expensive car that they can now get 10% off the high price they have just paid!

carsfan2

just looking on BMW website and they are now following suit albeit in the form of finance contributions.
4k on a 3 series. 5k on a 4 series and a few more. They aren't doing it on the more sought after models like X5 and new 5 series. In effect these "contributions" are price cuts and also encourage people to take pcp or finance.
it is a better way of preserving existing values than straight price reductions.
Wonder will Audi now do something?

mickdw

carsfan2 wrote: »

just looking on BMW website and they are now following suit albeit in the form of finance contributions.
4k on a 3 series. 5k on a 4 series and a few more. They aren't doing it on the more sought after models like X5 and new 5 series. In effect these "contributions" are price cuts and also encourage people to take pcp or finance.
it is a better way of preserving existing values than straight price reductions.
Wonder will Audi now do something?

Are they doing it on all 4 series models I wonder. They only list 420 petrol.
Its effectively zero percent finance only a little better.
Audi will throw their hat in the discount ring too I'm sure. The A6 is nearing model run out phase too so no doubt there will be deals there but I wouldn't buy a new one now as they are showing their age.
A4 is probably selling well but even so, sales would soon stand still if it's suddenly too expensive.

carsfan2

I think it is on all 4 series.
The small print at the bottom of the web page lists the exclusions.
5,X5,7 and i models so would think all 4 series included and all 3 except 330e.

bazz26

I'd say that's more to do with making the 3 and 4 more competitive to the newer A4 and recently launched new A5. 4 Series is also due a mid life refresh in March or April afaik.

digiman

bazz26 wrote: »

I'd say that's more to do with making the 3 and 4 more competitive to the newer A4 and recently launched new A5. 4 Series is also due a mid life refresh in March or April afaik.

They are not only doing it for the 3 and 4 series, it's for 1, 2 and some X series also. This is fantastic news altogether, I was only looking at a 161 430d this morning and the price of a new one wouldn't be much more now due to this. They seem to be doing approx 10% discount on any of the ones shown on their homepage. Take the 420i SE with an OTR of €45,350 and they are giving a €5k towards the cost so it's like an 11% discount. I wonder will they give the same % of discount on the bigger engine models or when you start adding in some extras. Hopefully they do, but probably need to ring up to find out.

Thank you Mercedes!!

carsfan2

You will have to sign up for some BMW finance to get the deposit contributions but you could just cancel and pay it off once you have got the car.
I'm guessing Bmw Ireland take the hit so you should still be able to haggle for more off the dealers margin.

bazz26

I cannot see it being good for resale values of used models to be honest. If someone interested in a 1 to 2 year old used model is not swayed to buy new then that means a used model is not sold. That and the value in importing from the UK cannot be good for resale values no matter how car makers play with figures.

bmwguy

Not good short term if you bought in the last year or 2. A typical 45k car is now a 40k car and a 1 year old will now have to be low 30s to compete. Further knock on effects all the way down then.

But long term it's a good move, paying less for our cars is a good thing and partly negates the VRT our government have, which while not illegal, is against the ethos of the EU.

I'm in the market for a used f10 so being selfish, I welcome the news. In the future I can see myself in an e class though, really beautiful car.

goochy

Alot of very irish I am alright to hell with the other guy views coming up here . We are a small country so we need the money from vrt end of story.
I having a bigger problem with them charging mad road tax rates on older cars worth little or letting people buying 100k diesel cars pay 200 euro in road tax while people pay 330euro for vans .

carsfan2

I don't agree re vrt
Think if cars were more affordable we would have a better fleet here than what we do. Think that's a whole other discussion.
I was talking to a guy who sells Toyota last week. Says orders for January are below this time last year and they are predicting at best a flat 2017.
If Mercedes BMW etc weren't worried about sales levels they wouldn't be doing these promotions.
Think the BMW thinking is slightly better as doesn't reduce the asking price pissing off owners of relatively new cars.

goochy

There's have been loads of New cars sold in Celtic tiger years and last few years regardless of vrt
We are not the UK or Germany we are a tiny country. Having loads of New cars sold is bad for resale values. I hope when brexit comes in they slap extra tax on UK imports to help the motor industry here and used car values
unlike most irish people I would rather a healthy economy than people being able to buy cars more cheaply

goochy

There's have been loads of New cars sold in Celtic tiger years and last few years regardless of vrt
We are not the UK or Germany we are a tiny country. Having loads of New cars sold is bad for resale values. I hope when brexit comes in they slap extra tax on UK imports to help the motor industry here and used car values
unlike most irish people I would rather a healthy economy than people being able to buy cars more cheaply

goochy

There's have been loads of New cars sold in Celtic tiger years and last few years regardless of vrt
We are not the UK or Germany we are a tiny country. Having loads of New cars sold is bad for resale values. I hope when brexit comes in they slap extra tax on UK imports to help the motor industry here and used car values
unlike most irish people I would rather a healthy economy than people being able to buy cars more cheaply

goochy

There's have been loads of New cars sold in Celtic tiger years and last few years regardless of vrt
We are not the UK or Germany we are a tiny country. Having loads of New cars sold is bad for resale values. I hope when brexit comes in they slap extra tax on UK imports to help the motor industry here and used car values
unlike most irish people I would rather a healthy economy than people being able to buy cars more cheaply

goochy

There's have been loads of New cars sold in Celtic tiger years and last few years regardless of vrt
We are not the UK or Germany we are a tiny country. Having loads of New cars sold is bad for resale values. I hope when brexit comes in they slap extra tax on UK imports to help the motor industry here and used car values
unlike most irish people I would rather a healthy economy than people being able to buy cars more cheaply

goochy

There's have been loads of New cars sold in Celtic tiger years and last few years regardless of vrt
We are not the UK or Germany we are a tiny country. Having loads of New cars sold is bad for resale values. I hope when brexit comes in they slap extra tax on UK imports to help the motor industry here and used car values
unlike most irish people I would rather a healthy economy than people being able to buy cars more cheaply

Esel

^ That must be a record!

bazz26

Could you repeat that again goochy?

James Bond Junior

Speak up goochy, missed what you said!

Slattsy

This is somewhat interesting and a little perturbing for me as I am due to pick up my C Class in January.

So basically im losing the guts of 5k compared to anyone that gets on this new deal. This deal will also effect the value of my car if I want to sell in a few years, as other people selling a 171 that have got this deal will have a bigger margin for a price reduction than me.

I might drop in to the dealer this evening and see if he can carry this reduction on my car. What are my chances??!!

maximum12

One of the reasons VRT is high is because Zero cars are made here so it's a lot of consumer spending leaving the country for very low economic activity. (dealers)

You may have noticed that wine has been getting whacked in budgets over the last few years but beer has avoided duty increases. We have dozens of breweries in the country and no wineries.

ShadowHearth

I know we talking here about luxury up class, but something really weird going in the world of dealers.

Ford just now went bananas amd slashed prices too. 5K off fiesta, 3.5K off focus etc. I wonder of this kick in the are just forced dealers to actually level the prices to some level with overseas. We always pay stupid amount here compared to UK. I know vrt, vat and other government taxes make the most of it, but still.

carsfan2

Slattsy
You should be getting the reduced price.
Dealer will have no problem doing this as the importer is bringing this reduction so shouldn't impact the dealer.
If you are trading in they may try to offer you less for your own but maybe not.
Threaten to cancel order if they're not budging but I would be surprised if you have any hassle

Slattsy

carsfan2 wrote: »

Slattsy
You should be getting the reduced price.
Dealer will have no problem doing this as the importer is bringing this reduction so shouldn't impact the dealer.
If you are trading in they may try to offer you less for your own but maybe not.
Threaten to cancel order if they're not budging but I would be surprised if you have any hassle

That's pretty much what I was thinking.
But wasn't sure if it was only on new orders from when this deal was announced & wanted to gauge the feedback from boardsies to see what the chances are of dealer carrying this over.

I'm after getting a ridiculously good price on trade in alright, if I lost a couple k on that - it still may work out at a reduction of 5% however.

FGR

Slattsy wrote: »

What are my chances??!!

I presume you've only paid a deposit and not the full amount for the car yet.

I can't see why you can't get in touch and say 'ere, what's the story?'. If your deposit was small you could do the maths and see if it's worth cancelling the current order and put in a new one somewhere else if they don't play ball.

goochy

why do irish people expect cars / taxes to be similar in a small country to be similar to a huge country like the Uk.?
said it before and will say it again , Irish people want everything cheap and then expect the country to survive and not go into recession.
I am Irish myself but I sum up most irish people as Well educated but little common sense . That's why we will never be a great little country

road_high

The adverts on the radio sound so tacky and not in keeping with a marquee like Mercedes. "10% price cut because of Brexit" sounds so crass and same as anything you'd read in some trashy tabloid.
I'm sure there are any number of more tasteful ways they could have done this. Must be very annoying and alienating to their existing loyal customers who paid full whack.

James Bond Junior

goochy wrote: »

why do irish people expect cars / taxes to be similar in a small country to be similar to a huge country like the Uk.?
said it before and will say it again , Irish people want everything cheap and then expect the country to survive and not go into recession.
I am Irish myself but I sum up most irish people as Well educated but little common sense . That's why we will never be a great little country

I'd have to agree with you. Champagne lifestyle on a lemonade budget. I would HAPPILY pay a little more in income tax if it meant proper services provided.

Back on topic I would be surprised if MB don't retrospectively apply the reduction to orders already made. It would be a PR disaster if they didn't and would potentially undo any increase they get through the reduction to begin with.

Slattsy

FGR wrote: »

I presume you've only paid a deposit and not the full amount for the car yet.

I can't see why you can't get in touch and say 'ere, what's the story?'. If your deposit was small you could do the maths and see if it's worth cancelling the current order and put in a new one somewhere else if they don't play ball.

Yup, just the deposit.

Will be arranging a meeting with dealer for tomorrow evening, so i'll report back.

carsfan2

I'll be very surprised if you don't get this deal and probably the sales man should have contacted you already to tell you the good news.
What merc have you on order?

Slattsy

carsfan2 wrote: »

I'll be very surprised if you don't get this deal and probably the sales man should have contacted you already to tell you the good news.
What merc have you on order?

C Class.