Mercedes C-Coupe Review

C-Coupe

"Oh Lord, Won't ya buy me a Mercedes Benz. Ma friends all drive Porsches, I must make amends! Worked hard all ma life time, no help from ma friends, So Lord, won't ya buy me a Mercedes Benz...."

Unbelievably these lyrics are from a Mercedes Benz advert from 1995. I honestly thought that this advert was no more than 8 years ago, until I researched it (when I say researched, I clearly mean looked it up on You Tube) to find that it is 17 years ago!!! I was only 12 years old back then, yet remember so clearly seeing that advert for the first time whilst looking outside my bedroom window at my parents brand new Peugeot 405. We were the talk of the street with that car, since most of the cars on my road had more rust than paintwork, So God only knows what sort of a reaction we would have got if it had been a Mercedes Benz.....

Mercedes has always been a hugely desirable brand for pretty much everyone. From Granddad with his brown leather driving gloves, to Mr Gangster Rapper pulling up to see his 'bitches' or perhaps indulging in a bit of poppin' caps in some poor sod's ass from the passenger window...... Mercedes clearly have a car for everyone an every occasion.

The only place that they have been falling short recently is with the lack of a proper 3 series coupé rival. I know they had the C Coupe, but that is like comparing a day in bed with Jennifer Aniston with having your balls 'scratched' in the same way as Daniel Craig endured in Casino Royale. It was a bloody awful and extremely uncomfortable place to be........

Finally, Mercedes have addressed this with the wonderfully styled and originally titled C-Coupé.

I adore the cars that Mercedes are currently producing as they are making some superb looking cars at the moment. Just look at the some of the product range: CLS, S-Class, CL, SL and the absolutely delectable SLS (especially the roadster) and tell me they aren't great looking cars!!! You can't, can you? Each car has a very similar corporate look to the frontend, however, unlike some of their German rivals, who prefer to use tracing paper when designing their 'latest model', Mercedes seem to let their designers play around and see what happens and I love the results. Ok, so the G Wagon looks like an expensive Nissan Cube, but other than that Mercedes are really getting things right.

Thankfully, the designers have worked their magic on the C-Coupé as well. It really is a lovely looking car and in my opinion, a better looking car than the 3 Series Coupé. Inside it is typical Mercedes, with a well laid out and superbly built cabin. The materials used have a quality feel to them, but then they should do as prices start from £30,200!! That's £3,200 more than the base model 3 Series Coupé which is a hell of a difference in this current financial climate, where even those that can afford these cars are watching the pennies.

So, is it worth the extra? For me at least, I think it is and here's why.

The BMW is substantially cheaper, it just about beats the Mercedes for interior cabin/boot space as the Mercedes rear roofline gives your less head room than in the back of the BMW. Also, the BMW's firmer suspension gives you more confidence to attack the twisty country lanes harder than the Mercedes. But if I'm going to be spending north of £27,000 on a car, I want/need it to make me feel that before I even get in to it that I'm about to drive something special and, excluding the M3, the 3 Series Coupé hasn't done that for me for years. In fact, I can tell you that I last got that feeling about a 3 Series Coupé was when I picked up my new BMW 318MSport Coupe on the 30th of June 2004, 4 days before my 22nd birthday. I'm sure that the bottle of Moet and flowers welcoming me to the dealership might have also influenced my feelings at the time.........

With the Mercedes though, you do get that special feeling. I genuinely looked forward to driving it before I got out of the house as It oozes style and once inside, it drives superbly. Ok, so in my opinion the 250CDi engine felt a tad underpowered but I tend to drive like Michael Schumacher on LSD, so Mercedes could have given me the C63 AMG and I'd have said I'm have liked it to have been a tad faster. (If anyone at Mercedes is reading this, please feel free to send me a C63 Coupé demo to compare......).

Perhaps I'm getting old or maybe it's because I'm now a daddy, but I quite like the 'slightly' soft suspension. That is a surprising word to use given that all UK C-Coupés are fitted with lowered AMG springs but it complements the car really well. The BMW is faster through the bends but you pay for that with the firmer suspension, especially if you have the 19inch wheels. But unless you are going to be taking it on a track or drive like an LSD'd up McSchumi everywhere, you'll find the Mercedes is the more comfortable, easier to drive and therefore more pleasant place to be over the 3 years of ownership.

Thanks for reading


Stuart McKay