Time and time again, it’s been proven that one big tweak can make a car way more attractive. Chrysler offering dual sliding doors on its third-generation minivans turned those things into game-changers. BMW dropping a twin-turbocharged inline-six into the 3 Series turned it from an excellent sports sedan into a tuner legend. Oh, and can you imagine what the Corvette would be remembered as today if Zora Arkus Duntov didn’t come along? In that vein, this is the new Mercedes-Benz CLA Shooting Brake, and while it’s not a massive visual improvement over the new CLA, turning a swoopy-roofed sedan into a wagon completely changes the proposition.
It’s worth noting that this isn’t the first so-called CLA Shooting Brake Mercedes has offered, even if shooting brakes typically feature two passenger doors rather than four. The luxury automaker’s seen demand in Europe for a small, reasonably priced yet upscale wagon for the past decade, unveiling the first-generation CLA Shooting Brake in Los Angeles back in 2015 as some form of cruel practical joke. Yeah, prior iterations of this model haven’t made it to America, but now it seems that Mercedes-Benz finally has one it should sell in America.
For one, the electric powertrain is packing some serious heat. Instead of a fairly ordinary turbocharged four-cylinder engine, Mercedes-Benz has gone with an 85 kWh battery pack and a 268-horsepower electric motor driving the rear wheels on the volume CLA 250+ model. The result is a claimed zero-to-62 mph time of 6.8 seconds and a driving range of 472 miles on the WLTP cycle, or only 16 fewer miles than an EQS 450+ that’s rated at 350 miles of range on the more demanding EPA cycle. In North American driving, this electric CLA wagon should be good for more than 300 miles of driving, a big league number for an entry-level EV. Want to juice up quickly? A DC fast charging peak of 320 kW is properly spicy, playing in a league beyond many 800-volt architecture cars, including the Hyundai Ioniq 5.
Then there’s the practicality, which is mostly give with a little bit of take. Admittedly, 16 cu.-ft. of rear cargo space with the rear seats up isn’t that impressive when a Volkswagen Golf GTI offers 19.9 cu.-ft. of space back there, and 45.5 cu.-ft. with the seats folded is 2.1 cu.-ft. down on the old CLA Shooting Brake, but not only is that an extra ten cu.-ft. of seats-down cargo space over a GTI, there’s also a 3.56 cu.-ft. front trunk usable at any time, regardless of how many passengers you’re carrying. Those are the sort of numbers that take the CLA 250+ Shooting Brake into crossover territory, all while offering a reasonably small frontal area and outstanding range.
As for the tech, if you’ve seen the new CLA sedan, you’ll know what good and bad things to expect. Bringing actual buttons and switches back to the steering wheel instead of capacitive touch controls is welcome, but I don’t think any customer in their right mind would’ve asked Mercedes-Benz to copy the window switches of the Volkswagen ID.4. High-power 100-watt USB-C ports will be great for charging laptops, but I have a feeling more people would want a second glovebox over a passenger screen. If you don’t pop for the passenger screen, you get backlit glossy trim that seems like a magnet for fingerprints, but a standard hands-free tailgate seems like it could be genuinely helpful, and standard heated front seats with four-way lumbar adjustment promise the luxury you’d expect from a Mercedes-Benz.
Oh, and if you don’t want a 268-horsepower electric powertrain, Mercedes-Benz will offer more choice. The CLA 350 4MATIC features dual electric motors with a combined output of 348 horsepower and a zero-to-62 mph time of five seconds flat, and an unusual hybrid powertrain will follow along soon after with a 48-volt system that can actually propel the car during light cruising and in town.
Will we see the new Mercedes-Benz CLA Shooting Brake in North America? Probably not, and that bums me out. Sure, it still has the trout-mouth of its trunked sibling, and some of the UX decisions don’t seem great, but I can’t help but feel that more cargo space is more appealing to North Americans than less cargo space.
Top graphic image: Mercedes-Benz
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Look, this would be a neat little wagon if it wasn’t so goddamn ugly! The little sheet metal strip between the light bar and grille is so egregious i simply cannot understand how that was allowed to be a thing
Why can’t Mercedes-Benz make cars that look like a Mercedes-Benz anymore?
The fish-themed styling and the Ford ZX2 taillamps were tired the first time around in the 90’s.
I promise to read the story at one point, but wanted to also chime in with what the hell? This thing is beyond hideous. Is that a new rich person thing now? Buy something garish and ugly just to piss off the poors? BMW moved in that direction, Mercedes had been, but now has firmly rooted themselves in the approach with this abomination with wheels. The Cybertruck went hard on all angles and being ugly, this thing went all in on the “hot pocket left in the microwave too long that now has bulged at one end”.
I just cannot fathom how the team Mercedes who made this can all agree that this thing is what the world needs right now. It’s like someone told an AI to design a car that costs a lot, but it’s looks are inversely proportional to cost, and this ugly blobfish came shooting out. It looks to have been excreted by a large aquatic mammal with a rectal prolapse that accidentally ate a bag of LED lights, then floated up to the surface. Even the seagulls wouldn’t bother eating what bobbed up, but Mercedes scared off all the flies off this turd, stuck another one of their giant logos on it, and went “ta-da!!!”.
Pardon my language but Jesus tapdancing Christ is this thing fucking ugly.
Not to defend the design decisions of Mercedes, because I think there was a lot of room to do better, but here’s my take.
Mercedes, starting with the EQs, has been making everything sleeker and sleeker and rounder and rounder to the point of blob, and now they are trying to backtrack a bit to add some visual interest with mixed success. I think we’ll look back at them as being more boring than offensive.
BMW keeps going more outrageous and aggressive and appears to have way overshot the boat on “polarizing” as a potential good thing. The only thing that makes todays 3-series look good is knowing that the next one is going to be even stupider.
I currently daily a W212 and like it quite a bit. Getting a bit long in the tooth though. I see a headline about a new electric wagon, and it gets me pretty excited! Click through to see… that… 🙁
Mercedes Benz lost me a while back as they started evolving their design language to having their cars look like used bars of soap with sad gaping fish-mouthed front ends. This is the ultimate manifestation of that and it’s hideous.
Modify some of the lighting and grille, take off the tri-star logo, and this could be a number of generic econoboxes from the past two decades. And that D-pillar is reminiscent of a recent Honda CR-V generation, not in a good way.
I remember when a Mercedes-Benz was “built to a standard, not a price”. I don’t even know what they’re doing now other than being an also-ran with some luxury bits thrown in. It’s sad. If Bruno Sacco was still alive, he’d weep.
Design team: “OK folks, remember the Lincoln MKT, but worse!”
That thing is really fucking ugly
Shooting Brake = 2 doors. Coupe = 2 doors.
MB: Hold my stein!
Good god that is horrible looking! The best looking picture is trunk with the seats down showing all that delectable cargo space (just don’t look at the dash!)
In an effort to find anything attractive about this vehicle, I will say that I like that it has mettalic silver paint instead of a solid light gray.
I would love more wagons, but this one looks like melted cheese.
I’m sure it’s nice, but I really don’t want to look at it.
I mean, I would rather see this around than the huge amount of boring SUVs. I guess the design is like that in order to get a decent amount of range from the battery. 85kwH gets me around 275 miles on my Blazer EV. Either they need to put a bigger battery for a more square design like a true wagon or play with aerodynamics and you get this.
It looks like a boring SUV trying to squat down to look like a strange station wagon.
The headlights remind me of a Dodge Dart.
Not a selling point on a Mercedes.
MB and Chrysler merged for a bit back in the aughts. The S class ended up looking like a Chrysler Concorde. Maybe this is MB’s kink?
That front end looks like it’s trying to swallow itself and failing.
It looks more like a liver than a bladder in most of the angles
Bladder-busting? Try an A4 VW Golf/Jetta TDI. 650-700 miles easy. And refillable in like 10 minutes.
I really miss the old M-B grills and folding hood badge. The current style is not as ugly as the current Lexus and some Toyota designs, but it’s not particularly attractive.
At a 70mph average 472 divided by 7 is, for buffers all around let’s say 6 1/2 hours of driving. Longer than I can go without a pee break. 650 miles at a 70 average is over nine hours and if you can go that long without one you’re probably dehydrated.
I have been called “bucket bladder” by friends and been known to pee like a racehorse for several minutes. Even had strangers go “damn!” on the duration and volume from adjoining stalls on occasion. I don’t have the TDI anymore, but my Accord will do nearly 500 miles before the low fuel light goes on. So, it’s a little easier on my aging bladder.
Other than the various SLs, Mercedes hasn’t released a good-looking car in, what, 25 years?
The first time I’ve seen a Mercedes in a long time and thought “I’d drive that” and of course it’s unlikely to come to America.
1. Obviously not a shooting brake.
2. Obviously not a wagon either.
3. This is what we call a good old fashioned hatchback. Or a “five door.”
Or a Rodius.
Or “fell out of the ugly tree and struck every single branch on the way down “.