Mercedes Citan to be released in 2013
Tuesday 14 February 2012 Back to Blog
Mercedes have confirmed they are to release a small van to the market.
The new van based on Renault's Kangoo template, is to be called Mercedes Citan. The van which will cost more than the van it is based on will cost less overall in running costs according to Steve Bridge of Mercedes.
"We will be more expensive, but the holding costs will be less than the Kangoo," said Bridge.
"It's far better to be able to compete on cost than on price. We will aim to have a more competitive contract hire rate than the Renault."
Mercedes will face an uphill battle to convince the running cost argument is a good selling point especially as most businesses including owner drivers look at the initial outlay most of all.
He continued: "Even some of the best buyers, sophisticated buyers, will only look at the front end price, it's what they're trained to do when buying things like toilet rolls so they use that behaviour and translate it to other operations.
"They don't think about things like durability, we're changing years and years of culture."
The Mercedes Citan will be sold in three sizes and use Renault engines. Bridge stressed it was not just a clone of Renault's popular small van range.
"We invested a lot to get the quality we wanted and now we're verifying that we reached the targets." Bridge said. "By 2016 we see ourselves as number two.
"We would be 8000-10,000 units behind Ford if they stay where they are."
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