Ever heard of Maybach?
Ask the average person on the street what they think of the Maybach Company, and unless you’ve happened upon Donald Trump or a car enthusiast, you’ll probably be met with a blank stare. But then again, Maybach doesn’t exactly market it’s product to the average person on the street. They can’t. After all, Maybach makes almost any Lexus look like a Honda Civic: the retail price for a Maybach in the United States ranges anywhere from $305,000 to $357,000.
Maybach and the world of ultra-luxury cars
The Maybach Company is presently one of the world’s premier producers and distributors of ultra-luxury cars. A traditionally German engineering firm, the company’s headquarters are stationed in Stuttgart, Germany. The technical, full name of the auto manufacturer is Maybach-Motorenbau GmbH. The company is presently classified as a private subsidiary of DaimlerChrysler Corporation. However, the Maybach Company has a rich, if at times nefarious, history dating from the first years of the Twentieth Century.
Early beginnings are in the air: 1909—1918
From 1909 to 1918, Maybach was a subsidiary of Luftschiffbau Zeppelin/GmbH and actually went by the name of Luftfahrzeug-Motorenbau GmbH (“Airship Engine Company”). Unfortunately for Luftfahrzeug the Kaiser along with the Central Powers lost the Great War. As part of the Armistice, Germany was banned from producing any airships. Not unlike the owners of BMW, Wilhelm Maybach adapted by reorganizing his company around car engines, renaming the enterprise in his honor.
From war to decadence to war…: the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s
During the Roaring ‘20s European elites, like their counterparts in the States, lived opulent lives. After an entire generation of European men died horribly in the trenches of the First World War, decadence and flamboyance were the zeitgeist of a continent trying to believe life could be normal, maybe even happy, again. Maybach went to work providing luxury cars for the bourgeois elite during the ‘20s and on into the ‘30s. As a German company, Maybach engineers provided the Nazis with engines for Panther and Tiger tanks that terrorized the Eastern and Western Fronts. The firm was also responsible for building large scale diesel engines that pulled trains.
… back to decadence again! 2002—Present
In 1997, Mercedes-Benz resurrected the Maybach name—displaying a newly designed, exploratory Maybach model as a concept car at the Tokyo Auto Show. The idea was popular, and since 2002 Maybach models have been offering the experience of personalized ultra-luxury cars to the mega-privileged. Maybach has been so successful in its post-holocaust revival niche that some experts maintain its only true competition is the Rolls Royce Phantom.
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