I"ll have my '23 Palisade Calligraphy write up done soon. Loved our time with it. If it had either a good hybrid/phev/ev or hell even a turbo 6 option like the Explorer Platinum and ST it'd likely have a spot in our garage. Size was a great balance.

 

this recently happened to someone with an EQS:

https://old.reddit.com/r/mercedes_be...y_bad_service/

the loaner for a broken EQS? an A-class lol

 

Awesome, I can't wait to read it. I watched a video on the Calligraphy the other day, can't believe you can get that line for roughly $50k. Insane value.

 

I agree completely. Had a midlevel SEL trim as a rental last year, and was so impressed that we would have strongly considered a Calligraphy had it been available when we bought our Q7--which had a sticker price fully 50% higher.

 

I've never driven one but Telluride/Palisades are supposed to be fabulous.

 

Odd, usually Mercedes' European operations are more customer-focused than what we get in North America. Seems like even the OP in that thread acknowledged they usually go above and beyond.

 

Oh yeah. I wouldn't directly compare an LX to a Yukon just because of size and vehicle objectives but yes, GM makes excellent full size SUVs. That can't really be disputed. They drive nice and easy and last a long time, and are tough.

I meant to add, the picture of that EQ-whatever I took at Mercedes the other day, I meant to tell everyone--- the EVs are stacked, packed full at that dealership and I see zero on the road. On the contrary lots of conventional Mercedes I see everywhere, lotttttttts.

 

The EQS is selling fine, although the S-class outsells it majorly just as MBUSA expected based on dealer messaging I've seen from my MBUSA contacts. The EQE just arrived at dealers not even two months ago so that would make sense that you haven't seen them on the road. What I don't think is going to sell at all is the EQB. The EQE and EQB in particular are overpriced, but it's the EQB that is legitimately a horrible value imo.

 

Don't know about Mercedes, but BMW service in Europe was terrible while I lived there. They did a nice job for regular maintenance service, like picking up the car from my office parking lot and leaving a loaner, albeit for an outrageously high price. But if something got broken (which wasn't infrequent), the wait times were terrible. Usually they would say something like "we will order the parts, call back in two weeks to schedule". If the issue was serious and rendered the car undriveable, the answer would usually be "sorry, there is nothing we can do about it". Fortunately, the company I worked for had a fleet of company cars I could use, but the response time for anything different than regular maintenance was terrible.
Funny enough, Renault was the exact opposite. Once day we were going to Italy, crossing Switzerland on a Sunday morning, and the "check engine" light turned on. I called Renault customer service (in France because the Swiss office would answer), and 30 min later they called me back and told me to drive to the nearest dealer which was about 40 km away. When I arrived, a mechanic arrived, opened the shop (which of course was closed as this was a Sunday morning), and fixed the problem in 20 min, no charge as the car was still under warranty. I was really surprised that they would open a dealership shop just for me, on a Sunday morning, do to warranty repair on a cheap Renault. In another occasion, the same car (which was my wife's car), wouldn't start in the morning, while I was already at work. I called a nearby dealer and asked if he could help. To my surprise, instead of scheduling an appointment or telling me to tow the car to the shop, he asked for my address and said "no problem, will send somebody to have a look". 30 min later a mechanic arrived at my house, and fixed the problem (a relay). Again, free of charge covered under warranty. This was in Belgium. I doubt any dealer in the US, no matter how expensive the car, would do a "house call".

 

Nice post <awesome>.
That's some amazing customer service.

 

In my experience, customer service has little to do with car brand or price. It all depends on who owns / runs the dealer. I have always received better service from smaller, privately owned dealers than from large ones owned by large corporations (think Autonation). I will cite three specific examples. I don't mind doing a bit of advertising for this guys. On the contrary, they treated me right, and I hope I can return the favor.
- Cronin KIA / Ford in Cincinnati, OH. I bought a new 2016 KIA Soul for my daughter from them. They had a "special" running on the Internet, offering the cars for $15.5k (about $2k below MSRP). They had 5 in stock, so I stopped by on a Wednesday evening to test drive the car and make an offer. It was too late to do the whole transaction, so I left them my information, signed a piece if paper and agreed to come back on Saturday to close the transaction. When I came back on Saturday morning they told me that they had "bad news" for me, they would have to redo all the paperwork. When I asked why, they said "We just sold one for $15k, it would be unfair to not honor the same price for you.". So 20 min wait to redo the paperwork translated to $500 savings for me. Their service department is also excellent. My daughter was taking the car for service there while she was still in Ohio, and they be extremely cheap compared to other dealers, and would turn around the service in less than 1 hr with previous appointment. They are small family owned company that only has two dealerships, a KIA and a Ford one, on the outskirts of Cincinnati (actually it's kind of in the middle of nowhere).
- Performance Toyota in Fairfield, OH. I bought 4 cars from them. They always gave me excellent prices. But the best part was service. They would charge less than small no-name shops for things like brake job, maintenance, or small repairs. One day I did 30k miles service on my FJ Cruiser. I always ask for estimate before leaving my car. At the time of payment the actual amount came $30 more than the estimate. I mentioned this to the service advisor, not as a complaint, just an observation. When I brought the car for the next service / oil change, they presented me with the invoice and the amount was $0. I asked why and the answer was "We gave you a wrong estimate last time, we want to make it right for you now." At another occasion, I brought a car to replace a defective driver seat (the height adjustment wasn't working properly). The car was 5k miles past warranty. I asked for estimate, they had me waiting for about 15 min and came back "Toyota will cover it under warranty. There is no way this problem just happened now. It must have started before the warranty expired." I didn't ask for warranty, they called Toyota on their own initiative and arranged to have it covered.
- Ricart Used Car Factory in Columbus, OH. We bought a used car from them for my son. They offered 6 months / 7.5k miles warranty on most used cars they sell. They are a large dealer representing several brands, but their main business is used cars, of which they used to hold hundreds in stock. We picked a car that was within our budget, did a test drive and agreed to buy it. We were half-way through the transaction with the Finance guy, when the Salesman who sold us the first car came back to tell us that he found something better for us. Same brand and model, but newer, less miles and in better shape. It was listed about $1.5k more than the car we agreed to buy. They told us that they would sell us the newer car for the same price as the older one. I asked what was the catch and they answer "No catch, we just have plenty of them and we want a happy customer." We took the offer, and I genuinely believe it was a legit. The car was in great shape, and my son didn't have any problems with it until 3 years later, once it crossed the 100k miles line.

All three are 5-star dealers in my opinion. Unfortunately, I can't say the same of the vast majority of other dealers I had to deal with.

 

Unfortunately there are a few similar situations on MBWorld with the EQS.

Depends on where you live. EQS SUVs are the only vehicles on the lot here that still have ADMs. They’re selling quite well. I see one every once and a while on the road but they are really low volume so seeing them is always going to be rare.

 

Yeah. I can see this.

 

Pounded back some green drinks

we are discussing on the couch…The Subaru Legacy is the best mid size car…. Anyone dispute that?

 

It wouldn’t be my choice for sure. Since the Mazda 6 is gone, I would probably choose the Accord.