Building Mercedes-Benz: the R-Class years

2015 – 2017

The contract: On 27 January 2015 AM General and Mercedes-Benz U.S. International announced that production of the long-wheelbase R-Class — by then a China-only model — would move from Mercedes-Benz's Tuscaloosa plant at Vance, Alabama, to the Commercial Assembly Plant in Mishawaka. The move made AM General, on the joint announcement's own statement, Mercedes-Benz's first and only contract manufacturer in the United States. It was expected to create more than 200 jobs. The first China-bound R-Class — the R 320 and R 400 long-wheelbase models — came off the Mishawaka line on 11 August 2015, built for a market where the model sold 12,000 to 14,000 a year.

A union footnote: The transfer carried a distinction the trade record notes: Tuscaloosa is a non-union plant, and the R-Class at Mishawaka became the first Mercedes-Benz model built in the United States with UAW labor — by the same Local 5 workforce whose history is told below. Production ended in October 2017, when Mercedes-Benz let the model go. Bloomberg's later account of the plant states what followed inside the company: when Mercedes walked away, AM General announced plans to close the plant — and the sale recorded in the next entry averted that closure.

Sources:

1. AM General / Mercedes-Benz U.S. International joint announcement, 27 January 2015 — the production transfer, the first-and-only contract-manufacturer status, the 200-plus expected jobs.
2. Contemporary trade and regional press, August 2015 — the first China-bound R-Class off the Mishawaka line, 11 August 2015; China sales of 12,000–14,000 a year; the first U.S.-built Mercedes-Benz model with UAW labor.
3. Bloomberg, 2021 — production ended October 2017; the closure plans the SF Motors sale averted.