Officially, the 140 sedan was launched at Genf 1991 in March 1991. However, if you lived through 1990 and followed some of the automotive journals, you might be wondering why the 140 was called a 1991 launch, since it had already been unveiled by Mercedes-Benz in late 1990. This is not an accident it is the result of a chain of events.
The story brought today is compiled from the memories of Michl Koch, a witness to the incident and a former employee of the Mercedes-Benz press department.
Mission
In June 1990, the new S-Class was approved by the board members in Almeria, southern Spain. However, development work was still ongoing. The only completely frozen part is just the styling, the corresponding next steps can be started immediately. The best time for shooting in the northern hemisphere is approaching September, Mercedes-Benz decided to invest extraordinary effort in the launch of the 140, which included extensive press photos and film clips.
Since September 1990, the press-shooting vehicles were secretly transported from Stuttgart to various parts of Europe. These cars come from pilot production and have been assembled partly by hand from serial parts since June 1990 in the recently retired R 107 factory Bau 32. After the R 129 was moved to Bremen for production, it became the rehearsal venue for the 140. In order to better present these cars to the world, all pilot production vehicles used for press shooting have been specially refined. The earliest photo was released on November 16, 1990, press department wired it to the automotive journals. This is the first official undisguised appearance of the 140.
Part of the massive marketing budget is a handful of movies that will feature the new S-Class’ many technological highlights. To prevent too much technology from turning the car cold, there is also something about humanity, which must include a 5-minute art film. According to the plan, the audience of this film is automotive journalists from all over the world who will attend Genf 1991 in March 1991. They will be invited by Mercedes-Benz to a five-star hotel in Geneva to watch the film before the start of the auto show.
Bretagne, located in northwestern France, is France’s largest peninsula and occupies one-third of the French coastline. The coast there is very jagged, with many cliffs, estuaries and promontories, and typical vegetation is forest and sand dunes. Bretagne was chosen as the location for outdoor filming. Mercedes-Benz had the special agency Steiner from Munich to do this EHQ -Extremely High Quality video. Mercedes press department and technicians will accompany Steiner on the filming of the film.
Ambush
No manufacturer wants leaks about a car that has not yet been launched, this is especially true for the most high-profile Mercedes-Benz, and in this case the most important product, the S-Class, a car that may influence the development direction of the world’s automotive industry in the next 10 years. Mercedes purchased a number of enclosed trailers to transport the vehicles for the press shooting, as the cars were to be filmed in completely uncamouflaged form in the months before to the launch, they had to be completely covered. The press department also had E6 film labs installed on these trailers, allowing them to develop Kodak film immediately after shooting to see the effects.
However, Stuttgarters, who are known for their economy, made a joke to themselves that these trailer trucks were second hand. One of which was an ex-racing car trailer purchased from a German racing team. The team owner, a Ford-dealer, told his friend, the chief editor of Auto Motor und Sport, how happy he was about the deal to sell the truck to Mercedes-Benz who need the trailer to transport their newest prototype. Subsequently, AMS obtained more information about the truck and sent paparazzi to begin monitoring the truck, following the team from Stuttgart to Bretagne in northern France. As soon as one of the shiny brand new S-class pulls out of the truck, AMS gets to work.
Bretagne is very open, thus the helicopter from Steiner was able to take aerial photos of the new S-Class along the coastline. The flip side of these advantages is that the low vegetation caused by the dry climate completely exposes the new S-Class, a large silver sedan that has been carefully waxed shines like a mirror in the dunes. The unfortunate 140 is a 500 SEL in 744 Brilliant Silver, A000046, the 46th 140 in the conventional sense.
During the break, the Mercedes crew hid the S-KU 7581 behind a dune, the car stands alone in a green meadow & dune surrounding and the exterior mirrors a folded in. AMS photographer managed to capture the side view using a long lens at a considerable distance. Even though the styling of the new S-Class is no longer a secret, AMS was still the first to get it without permission, which is a huge selling point for the magazine of next week.
Response
AMS made several calls to the Mercedes-Benz press department about their success and, of course, the entire Mercedes team was very frustrated.
“But in the end we decided on a couple of details that we would confirm and give them, more or less unofficilly. But in the end it was better to have an unwanted but rather concise story in the worlds most influencial magazine than one that gives fuzzy information and vague guessings.”
As a result, the news department had to proactively release a press conference in Sindelfingen from December 5th to 12th, avoid appearing passive. Media present can receive a thick press kit. The press kit reveals a wealth of technical details and several new photos, including a camouflaged interior. In this interior model, the seats are shown in their entirety, but the details are mosaic.
The press department also reached a timing agreement with AMS, so by the time the exclusive photos were delivered to stores across Germany by AMS, other media outlets had already obtained the same amount of information. The large amount of official information somewhat will neutralize the impact of the AMS exclusive photos, preventing people from considering that this is a marketing accident from Mercedes-Benz.
On December 14, 1990, S-KU 7581 hunted in Bretagne appeared on the cover of AMS with the title Exclusive: Mercedes S-Klasse. “For the first time with a twelve-cylinder engine. From 85,000 to 200,000 marks. The technology in detail.”
AMS’s text revealed how delighted they were: “There are only two and a half months left until the premiere of the new S-Class, time for the dress rehearsal. Mercedes allows the star of the stars to do his first striptease. Completely stripped of all the leaves, just as chief designer Bruno Sacco created him, he showed himself to the auto motor und sport photographer while he unabashedly took part in public traffic.”
Movie
Finally, before Genf 1991 started on March 7, the automotive journalists were invited to the Hotel Noga-Hilton on the shores of Lake Geneva for a 75-minute presentation and film screening. Below is the complete 5 minute art film include S-KU 7581. You may see quite a bit of footage taken in Bretagne, their landscapes match the AMS photos.
A total of two 140s participated in this movie, 744 Brilliant silver and 040 Black. The silver one is S-KU 7581 in the article, which was shot on location in Bretagne. The black V12 is S-KT 4186 (A000016), and although its clips show a lot of Parisian architecture, those were Virtual Realit clips shot in the studio. This explains why only S-KU 7581 was captured by AMS.
The MOT is valid for three years. According to the MOT sticker that expired in December 1993 on S-KU 7581 (corrected to November 1993, see Eduard’s comment), it can be inferred that it was just registered in December 1990 (corrected to November 1990).
The incident brought works around it to shame, and although there was also photo shot in Bretagne, almost no subsequent photos appeared in the press kit, except for one taken at night. Apparently, S-KU 7581 stayed in Bretagne for a few days to complete filming, and the longer stay gave opportunities not just for AMS, but actually for more potential journalists.
This incident directly led to the early disclosure of the new S-Class. The hunt for S-KU 7581 is just one piece of the many stories of the 140. Apart from some fun, I think a more certain conclusion is that in the vast history, every event has its driving factors behind it. Special thanks to Michl Koch for his contribution to this article.
All history are based on limited information, please email me if you have doubts about the veracity of this article. If you want to quote the content of this article, please contact me in advance, please do not use my text for any commercial purposes.
As always, very informative article. Thanks for that!
I just wanted to point out one small error regarding the technical inspection of S-KU 7581.
Firstly, it’s helpful to point out that the sticker shown in your picture corresponds to the emissions inspection. Until 2010, the front numberplate carried the hexagonal emissions inspection sticker (Abgasuntersuchung in german) and the rear one carried the round general technical inspection sticker (Hauptuntersuchung).
In 2010, the two inspections were combined, so that cars nowadays only carry the round sticker on the rear number plate.
Now, having said that, the hexagonal sticker on your picture shows an expiration date of November 1993, not December. The month pointing upwards (in this case 11-November) is the expiration month.
Hence we can deduce that S-KU 7581 was registered in November 1993.
Thanks for your reading and correction! I’m sure this will help future threads.
I’ve already marked it in the article.