Mercedes is the first premium german manufacturer which will produce a sedan in USA. C-Class will be build along ML, GL and the future SUV coupe based on ML at Tuscaloosa plant.
For the first time, a premium german carmaker will produce a sedan in USA. First C-Class saloon rolled of the line in Tuscaloosa on June 18. The Tuscaloosa plant plays an important role for Mercedes Benz in the global production network for the C-Class, and, for the first time, the company will produce the C-Class sedan on four continents. It only took six months in order to start the production on all four plants – Bremen, East London, South Africa, Beijing and Tuscaloosa.
The production volume will be increased furthermore next year with the introduction of another SUV, presented at the Auto China Show in Beijing, as a “Concept SUV Coupe”. In fact, Concept SUV Coupe is the SUV-coupe version based on actual ML and will compete with BMW X6. This SUV coupe will be build along M-Class, GL-Class and C-Class.
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One in fifth passenger cars produced by Mercedes are bought by an American customer, thus making USA the biggest sales market for the company. 312,534 Mercedes models were sold last year in USA.
The Tuscaloosa plant was built in 1995 and started production of M-Class in 1997. Since then, more than two million vehicles have been produced at this location. Furthermore, the company gave back to the community the 3,400 direct jobs that were created, thus being a win-win situation. But this is not all, a job at the Tuscaloosa plant creates seven more at suppliers and service providers. More than four billion US dollars have been invested by Mercedes – Benz since 1993 which includes the 2.4 billion dollars for the 2010 -2015 expansion phase.
