Tropicana Magazine Mar-Apr 2018 #117: Edge Of Excitement

THE DRIVE
The brand with the three-pointed star
was persuaded by its American importer
Max Hoffmann to adapt the racing issue
of the 300 SL for road use. The car boasted
a unique shape, and performance which
shamed contemporary products from
Porsche and the rest of the competition.
The up-and-over doors made the 300
SL into a star, and celebrities queued up to
be seen in one or to call the car their own.
Unfortunately, stars are apt to wane, and
that is what happened to the 300 SL.
It hardly seems possible today,
when a fine example of the car will fetch
around USD 1.4 million, but in the 1950s,
enthusiasm for the exotic German car faded
fast.
In 1957 – only three years after the
gullwing made its debut – the company sold
just 70, says York Seifert, who publishes the
magazine of the Mercedes-Benz 300 SL Club
in Germany.
It was just as well for the Stuttgart maker
that importer Hoffmann agreed to take
several hundred more examples, thereby
persuading Mercedes-Benz not to stop
production. Hoffmann imposed only one
condition: If Stuttgart wanted him to sell
more gullwings, then they would have to
produce a drophead version of the 300 SL.
Blueprints for a fresh-air variant already
existed, and the car was ready to roll in 1955.
Stuttgart opted to phase out the gullwing in
favour of the ragtop, and business took off.
Hoffmann was a shrewd salesman,
and he saw that many customers for
the glamorous gullwing found the car
impractical. Ventilation was poor and the
doors made for a high side entry.
IMAGE BY ROYCE RUMSEY/DPA/THE INTERVIEW PEOPLE
“The advent of
the gullwing was
the automotive
equivalent of
a flying saucer
landing on earth. It
was also arguably
the world's first
supercar.”
119 MARCH/APRIL 2018 | TM