Mercedes-Benz and the trucks for all time

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You may have seen marketing-mobiles before, and perhaps you even spotted the wacky display of them at this year’s Le Mans Classic, but this one might be in a league of its own. It’s not just a marketing-mobile, but more of a mobile shop-cum-showroom-cum-display for Kienzle watches and clocks - Germany’s oldest watchmaker.

Two of these 16.5-metre (54ft.) long and 16-ton machines were made in 1937, based on Mercedes-Benz chassis and bodied by bus manufacturer Gaubschat of Berlin. The vehicles were equipped with Siemens electrical systems with their own motor and charging station to power a radio receiving system, a gramophone and microphone system, neon advertising lights while inside you could also find a refrigerator, telephone system, and running water with a 170-litre tank.

Imagine it coming to your village and being parked on the market square at the time! The Kienzle watch-making company had been very successful and boasted in its advertisements of 1937 of making 15,000 watches a day with a staff of over 3,000. It had sold over 25 million wristwatches by that time and had also been making clocks for motor cars since 1902, selling them eventually to a wide array of manufacturers ranging from Opel to Rolls-Royce.

During the Second World War, the company made chronograph cockpit clocks for Messerschmitt and Heinkel aircrafts as well as wrist and pocket watches for the Wehrmacht and Luftwaffe. It is unknown what happened to the two Mercedes.

Words: Jeroen Booij; pictures: Kienzle Uhren
 

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