Mercedes-Benz eyes Atlanta for U.S. headquarters (Savannah, Brunswick: moving, manufacturing)

[jlaud12]

Originally Posted by J2rescue

Where is the Savannah talk coming from? Mercedes may put some type of port related operation in Savannah but its not going to be their US HQ. It's just not going to happen.

LOL I was wondering the same thing.

[LovelySummer]

This would be smart given that Atl and Beverly Hills are two major MB markets in the U.S. MB if Buckhead told me they follow only MB of Beverly Hills in nationwide sales.

[Galounger]

Originally Posted by J2rescue

Where is the Savannah talk coming from? Mercedes may put some type of port related operation in Savannah but its not going to be their US HQ. It's just not going to happen.

It could definitely happen. BMW put their U.S. Headquarters in the tiny town of Greer, S.C. not in Columbia or Charleston which are both far away. But, like I said earlier it's because their flagship U.S. factory is located there.

So if you hear that Savannah is chosen for the HQ you will probably hear announcements for a major Mercedes plant there also. Not far fetched at all since there is a mega site in Pooler made and waiting for just such a plant.

[Mutiny77]

Originally Posted by Galounger

It could definitely happen. BMW put their U.S. Headquarters in the tiny town of Greer, S.C. not in Columbia or Charleston which are both far away. But, like I said earlier it's because their flagship U.S. factory is located there.

So if you hear that Savannah is chosen for the HQ you will probably hear announcements for a major Mercedes plant there also. Not far fetched at all since there is a mega site in Pooler made and waiting for just such a plant.

BMW's U.S. manufacturing HQ is in Greer, which is a shared suburb of Greenville and Spartanburg and sits in the middle of that region of almost a million and a half people. BMW's U.S. corporate HQ is in Woodcliff Lake, NJ.

Again, the U.S. corporate HQ of Mercedes relocating to Savannah is a looooooong shot.

[AtlantaComment]

Savannah is not in the running for the HQ and never will be.

They are not moving from the NYC suburbs with easy access to Newark airport and non stops to Germany to freaking Savannah. The national HQ needs to be somewhere with good domestic and international airport access.

[Galounger]

Originally Posted by Mutiny77

BMW's U.S. manufacturing HQ is in Greer, which is a shared suburb of Greenville and Spartanburg and sits in the middle of that region of almost a million and a half people. BMW's U.S. corporate HQ is in Woodcliff Lake, NJ.

Again, the U.S. corporate HQ of Mercedes relocating to Savannah is a looooooong shot.

But it's the plant that prompted BMW to locate their HQ there. You underestimate the importance of a major plant. At a flagship plant like Greer's prototypes of future models are rolled out and tested. The information they get from this testing is extremely valuable to Marketing.

Also German and Japanese Automakers are more engineering driven and less marketing and sales driven than American Automakers ( I personally think this is why they have almost driven Detroit out of business all together) so they love to have their main HQs located at state of the art sprawling manufacturing, design and research facilities like Toyota City in Japan or BMW's headquarters in Germany where visitors can witness the production of their most prized vehicles.

[Mutiny77]

Originally Posted by Galounger

But it's the plant that prompted BMW to locate their HQ there. You underestimate the importance of a major plant. At a flagship plant like Greer's prototypes of future models are rolled out and tested. The information they get from this testing is extremely valuable to Marketing.

BMW made it clear in no unquestionable terms that the corporate HQ was NOT moving to SC. The metro simply doesn't have the infrastructure or workforce necessary to lure and retain a company of that caliber, and the same goes for Savannah which is a third of the size of the Upstate. Manufacturing operations are one thing, but corporate operations are another thing altogether. Savannah doesn't have direct flights to Germany for one, and that's a biggie. When Toyota NA was looking to move from CA, one major reason why the Dallas area was chosen over Charlotte is because Charlotte, despite having one of the nation's busiest airports, has no direct flights to Asia.

[AtlantaComment]

Originally Posted by Galounger

But it's the plant that prompted BMW to locate their HQ there. You underestimate the importance of a major plant. At a flagship plant like Greer's prototypes of future models are rolled out and tested. The information they get from this testing is extremely valuable to Marketing.

Except BMW's US Corporate HQ is not at the SC plant, it is in New Jersey.

[Galounger]

Originally Posted by Mutiny77

BMW made it clear in no unquestionable terms that the corporate HQ was NOT moving to SC. The metro simply doesn't have the infrastructure or workforce necessary to lure and retain a company of that caliber, and the same goes for Savannah which is a third of the size of the Upstate. Manufacturing operations are one thing, but corporate operations are another thing altogether. Savannah doesn't have direct flights to Germany for one, and that's a biggie. When Toyota NA was looking to move from CA, one major reason why the Dallas area was chosen over Charlotte is because Charlotte, despite having one of the nation's busiest airports, has no direct flights to Asia.

You missed what I was saying all together in my last post. In Japan and Germany where Craftsmanship and good engineering are considered priority one the two (manufacturing and Corporate) are intertwined. Especially in the culture of Mercedes. They want their engineers and researchers close to the action at their most important manufacturing facilities and they want their corporate leaders close to the engineers (most of their corporate execs are engineers or former engineers) It's a drastically different concept than the direction American car makers took after Henry Ford and the Dodge boys died and frankly one that produces superior cars.

We will see.

[kasuga888]

There is prob not a sufficient skilled white collar workforce in sleepy Savannah for the corporate side.