Mercedes-Benz sells its Sprinter light CV range in 130 countries worldwide and gave the new, smaller Vito van its public debut at the recent IAA CV Show at Hanover in Germany. Speaking at the launch, head of Mercedes-Benz van division, Volker Mornhinweg, said that the company would launch the Vito in the US, where the Sprinter has been on sale for a number of years.

NAFTA sales for Vito

‘Currently we have the Vito on sale in Europe,’ Mornhinweg told IFW, ‘Russia was always a very good market for this kind of product, but is struggling a bit at the moment. We launched the Vito in China in 2010; it’s on sale in Australia and other markets. Some years ago we decided that our clear aim would be to launch Vito in NAFTA – the US market, Canada and Mexico and then also to Latin America. The main market there will certainly be Brazil, then Argentina, Chile and Peru.’

The South American markets have not been having an easy time this year and Mornhinweg acknowledges that these markets seem to fluctuate more than those in North America or Europe. ‘But in the end, we have to deal with it,’ he says, ‘That’s why we put a strategy in place which is ‘Mercedes Vans Goes Global’. In earlier times we were extremely focussed on Europe, in markets like Germany and the UK, but in the end, you cannot look only to these regions. There’s no question that they are always very good regions for us and this is our home base, but at the end of the day for a company like ours you have to stabilise your overall business. That means you have to be in each of the regions on the planet.’

Global presence necessary

‘As you know, after the Lehman Brothers crisis (2008), we had more or less a kind of shut down in Europe. If you are only present in one region, you are more or less in a challenging situation and therefore you have to get it balanced all over the world, therefore it’s important for a company to be all over the world.’

The Sprinter was originally launched in the US in 2001, branded Freightliner – one of Daimler’s US truck brands. It wasn’t until 2010 that it was launched as a Mercedes-Benz. North American distribution differs from Europe in that in Europe, van sales are channelled more through the Mercedes-Benz truck dealer network. ‘That means at the point of sale, we are also selling through passenger car dealers too, but 80% of business is through the truck network,’ explains Mornhinweg, ‘In the US it’s the other way around, because there was already a passenger car dealer network there, so we can say that, except for Freightliner, we are more or less 100% with the passenger car network.’

Three steps to fleet business

When it comes to fleet business, Mornhinweg says that the company takes a three-step approach, ‘That means that we have an international team, based at Mercedes’ Stuttgart head office in Germany. A lot of companies, such as FedEx or UPS are also based worldwide and they would not want to discuss their fleet business individually in every country with different Mercedes-Benz dealers, so that’s the task of our international team.

‘Then we have the national head offices, for example in the US or UK and they deal with what we describe as the national fleets and then for small and medium enterprises (SME) the business is handled by the dealers and that’s the same all over the world.’

Retail or fleet?

In Europe, the Sprinter has been seen as more of a fleet product because of its size and the extensive number of body options available, while the Vito is seen as more of a retail product and it looks as though there will be a similar division in the US, ‘In the US, Vito will be more retail business’, confirms Mornhinweg, ‘Because there are more smaller companies and we’ve heard that one of our competitor’s products is seen as being a bit too small, so the Vito is about the right size for these kinds of businesses and on the other hand, the Sprinter is too big for them when they have to drive downtown, so the Vito’s dimensions are better for SMEs.

‘Also when it comes to people movers, this business is something that is more in the hands of not-for-profit organisations and they are keen to have these kinds of products too because fuel consumption is good and when it comes to safety the market wants safe products.’ Vito is due to go on sale in North America in 2015, during the second half of the year and will be rolled out across the region from the start.

More co-operation on product?

Mercedes-Benz is one of the few light CV manufacturers currently producing vehicles on its own, excepting the Citan, a re-worked Renault Kangoo. That changes with the new Vito, which will be available with a front-wheel-drive Renault-sourced power option. Will that be enough to control the cost of building light CVs or will Mercedes need to build vans in the kind of partnerships that exist between other European light CV manufacturers?

‘It makes a lot of sense to partner with somebody to get economy of scale,’ says Mornhinweg, ‘Our biggest partner is Mercedes-Benz Cars. We have a very close and good relationship and we work extremely closely together when it comes to modules and powertrains. Secondly, there are sometimes parts or modules where it might be more efficient to work with an outside partner like Renault. Having said that, it must make sense in terms of product and brand identity and if that is not diluted, we will do it and where we see an impact regarding our brand, we wouldn’t do it. We would decide that module by module, or situation by situation. We don’t have a dogmatic approach to say that we would always do it this way or that way. It has to be a flexible approach.’ It’s reasonable to suggest that we should not expect the next generation Sprinter to share a Renault Master body shell.

Could we expect to see the smaller Citan van on sale in North America? ‘Our approach is to start now with the Vito and see how this product is received in the market, wait for feedback then see what we do in the future.’