You’ve probably gone through life thinking that you had the name of this popular car brand nailed, but we’re here to tell you that you’re wrong.
Mercedes is arguably one of the most iconic brands and boasts one of the most recognisable logos in the world, but despite being around for near a century, people are still getting their name wrong.
Originally from Germany, cars from the brand are associated with style, sleekness, business and luxury.
How do you pronounce Mercedes? (Sean Gallup/Getty Images)
The auto company was established in 1926 by Karl Benz, Gottlieb Daimler, Wilkelm Mayback and Emilt Jellinek.
It turns out that the latter, Jellinek, named Mercedes after his daughter’s name.
But little did they know that the company would become the huge name that it is today, one of the behemoths of the car industry.
Although, this doesn’t necessarily mean that people are saying their name correctly.
Saga car insurance carried out a study, asking Brits to pronounce the names of 30 of the nation’s best-selling car manufacturers.
The drivers were also asked to spell them and draw their logos from memory.
Almost all the Brits participating in the study pronounced the car brand wrongly (Alexander Koerner/Getty Images)
It turned out that Mercedes was one of the most difficult names to pronounce, as only 20% of participants authentically pronounced it, as the majority said ‘Mer-say-deez’.
In fact, people were so split on the correct pronunciation that one took to Reddit to ask for help, pointing out that ‘the F1 commentators say Mersaydees’, though they say ‘Merseedays’.
Users in the comments suggested ‘Mair-they-dayth’ and ‘Mur – Say – Deez’ among others, but one hit the nail on the head.
The user wrote: “The correct German way to pronounce it is Mertz-saydez”.
So although ‘Mer-say-dees’ isn’t too far off, the ‘Mertz’ part of the pronunciation is what is missing from a lot of people’s take on the brand name.
A video of the Mercedes-Benz CEO pronouncing the word on X caused a stir though, as he seemed to pronounce the name in an unauthentic manner.
It was captioned: “Mercedes-Benz CEO Ola Källenius shares how the name ‘Mercedes’ came about,” and he also confirmed the story of the company being named after one of the founders’ daughters.
However, the brand’s recognition was highlighted in the other aspects of Saga’s survey, where the Mercedes logo was the second most recognised, while 50 percent of them could accurately recall the company’s three-pointer star logo.
Of those that attempted a drawing, a massive 88 percent could accurately recreate it.
Despite struggling with pronunciation across the board, 83 percent of Brits successfully spelt Mercedes-Benz correctly.
