The new Mercedes-Benz 'showroom' at Brooklands in southern England is
nearing completion.  Then there will be two more in Manchester and
Birmingham.

Is the way forward or hubris?

No word if they plan something like this in Germany.

http://driving.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,12389-1521257,00.html

Earlier I had read that they plan to have 'factory collections' from here,
too.

DAS

For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling
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           Biggest showroom on the planet
           By Joseph Dunn of The Sunday Times
           A ?45m showroom with test tracks and cinema attached is taking
shape at Brooklands

           Brooklands is steeped in motoring history. Its clubhouse and
museum hark back to the golden age of racing and the track itself, opened in
1907, is regarded as the birthplace of British motor sport. Next summer the
site will also become the birthplace of a new type of car dealer.
           DaimlerChrysler, the owner of Mercedes-Benz, has bought the
159-acre site and is in the final stages of building the world's first
mega-dealership.

           Set in the Surrey commuter belt - one of the richest areas in
Britain - and billed as the Heritage and Technology Centre, the complex will
feature a huge showroom, a museum, five-star hotel and cr?che as well as
three test tracks and a cinema showing films of Mercedes cars in action.

           It is one of three super-showrooms planned by Mercedes that
looks set to revolutionise the way we buy cars, in the same way that
out-of-town shopping centres such as Lakeside in Essex and Bluewater in Kent
have changed the face of high street retail.

           "We will be able to have 100 cars on display as opposed to half
a dozen that we have in a showroom," says Dermot Kelly, the managing
director of Mercedes Car Group in the UK. "It will enable us to exhibit cars
in a way that you can't recreate in a normal environment. There will be more
colours, options and body styles on display than you could ever see in a
normal dealer."

           Mercedes has lavished ?45m on the project, which is just down
the road from the McLaren technology centre where the Mercedes SLR McLaren
road car is built. The main building will cover 725,000 sq ft and include
exhibition space for 250 people, a 120-seat cinema and six simulators that
can recreate being in a Formula One car going round Silverstone.

           Not only will customers be able to see the cars and learn how
they are made, they will also be able to try them out on a test track and
off-road course before they buy them.

           The centre also boasts a wet circuit with a ceramic tile surface
enabling potential customers, with the help of a qualified instructor, to
learn how functions such as antilock braking systems and electronic
stabilisation programs work.

           Useful, educational and spectacular this all may be, but the
ultimate aim of the centre is more hard-nosed - to ensure that the customer
buys a car and to burnish the reputation of a manufacturer that appears to
have lost its way of late.

           To do this the company talks about creating a "brand experience"
to encourage people to feel part of the Mercedes family, and it is no
coincidence that it chose Brooklands as the site for its mega-dealership.
Before they merged, Mercedes and Benz cars were in the first race at
Brooklands in 1907 and set a land-speed record there in 1909. It is a rich
seam of nostalgia and glamour that Mercedes is happy to mine but the centre
is just the beginning: two more mega-dealerships are planned for Manchester
and Birmingham.

           "In today's saturated and competitive market, where all cars are
very good, car makers need to find new ways of making people buy their
cars," says Nigel Wonnacott from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and
Traders. "Mercedes is using the wow factor. This is the history of the
product, this is the product in action and - by the way - you can test it on
this track. It could well be the future of motor sales."

           The idea of "brand experience" has already spread to Mercedes'
main rival. BMW currently has a tie-up with the Rockingham race circuit in
Northampton, where owners of BMWs and prospective owners can test out
various BMW models on the track. It is a long way from the sophistication of
the Brooklands venture but the trend is unmistakable.

           "You buy into a brand because you are using the product rather
than simply seeing it," says Wonnacott. " In the case of Brooklands,
Mercedes wants the customer to go away with a warm feeling of being part of
a family and the three-pointed star emblazoned on their soul."

           But not everyone will warm to the Mercedes mega-dealership. The
company has steadily been closing small local dealerships in recent years.
The night of the long knives came four years ago when Mercedes put all 159
of its British dealers on a year's notice. Mercedes consolidated its outlets
with 35 so-called super-dealers throughout the country, each one owning
several individual showrooms.

           The disappearance of local dealers is a trend that can be seen
across the motoring landscape. In 1993 there were 8,747 franchised dealers
of all brands - today there are fewer than 6,000. Those survivors are
actually controlled by fewer than 3,000 separate companies. The top 20
companies control 1,178 franchised dealers.

           "Manufacturers like to be in control and when Mercedes sacked
its private dealers they were trying to streamline their control over just a
few large companies," says Alan Pulham, the director of the National
Franchised Dealer Association. "The problem is that the rise of the
super-dealer has led to the demise of small local dealers. But some people
like the fact that you can build a relationship with your local dealer.
There is a more personal element to it."

           The growth of super-dealers has accelerated since the end of the
block exemption for the motor trade in October 2003. The block exemption
effectively freed car manufacturers from some European competition laws,
meaning that the motor giants could operate wide-ranging control over their
franchises and the supply of new vehicles.

           The end of the block exemption meant any company could buy any
dealership. In a stroke, the power of the car makers was dramatically curbed
and the growth of massive, more independent-minded dealers was stimulated.

           The Brooklands project is seen by some as an attempt by Mercedes
to wrest back control from the small number of powerful dealers.

           "The vehicle makers' nightmare has always been that the tail
would wag the dog," says Professor Garyl Rhys of the Centre for Automotive
Industry Research at Cardiff Business School. "The idea that the dealer
would be acting like a big retailer in any other business is unimaginable to
them. For example, it is Marks & Spencer that calls the shots rather than
the people who make the product. The motor industry is one of the few
industries where that isn't the case and the vehicle makers are desperate
for it to remain that way.

           "Over the past few years the rise of the large dealer groups has
started to challenge that control and, as Mercedes has found, one of the
ways of countering that is to create your own outlet, such as Brooklands."

           Not surprisingly, Mercedes claims that this is far from the
case. Will Robson, a spokesman for the company, says: "We want to work with
existing dealers and the hope is that customers will come to Brooklands and
enjoy the Mercedes experience then return to their local dealer and buy the
car from them."

           Either way, just as Brooklands ushered in a new age of motoring
almost 100 years ago, it looks set to lead the way in changing how we buy
our cars in the future.

           "There is a real redrawing of the boundary of power between
dealers and manufacturers and where that line ends up nobody yet knows,"
says Rhys. "The only danger is that the consumer will lose out if either
side gains too much power."