Back in 1883 Karl Benz founded the firm Benz & Cie. in Mannheim and seven years later, Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft (DMG) was formed in Cannstatt. The inventors Gottlieb Daimler and Karl Benz used their own names – “Benz” and “Daimler”, which vouched for the origin and quality of the engines and vehicles. Mercedes, which is of Spanish origin meaning ‘grace’, was the name given to the daughter of the Austrian businessman named Emil Jellinek, born in 1889.

In 1897, Jellinek ordered his first Daimler. A year later he ordered two Daimler “Phoenix” cars being the world’s first road vehicles with four-cylinder engines. Jellinek began to promote and sell Daimler automobiles, which brought about an increase in demand. In fact, in 1990 DMG supplied Jellinek a total of 29 cars; a very good amount compared with the 10 vehicles delivered in the previous year.

As from 1899, Jellinek took the initiative to use Daimler cars in order to participate in racing meetings. His pseudonym, ‘Mercedes’, was initially used as a team and driver designation.

At the beginning of April 1900, Jellinek made an agreement with DMG to develop a new engine bearing the name “Daimler-Mercedes”, introducing Jellinek’s pseudonym as a product designation. Two weeks later, Jellinek ordered 36 of the vehicles at a total price of 550,000 marks – equivalent to €2.8 million. Subsequently, he placed another 36-vehicle order, allot of which were with 8 hp engines.

Three days before Christmas 1900, DMG delivered Jellinek with the first vehicle to be fitted with the new engine - a 35 hp racing car. Developed by Wilhelm Maybach (DMG’s chief engineer), this first ‘Mercedes’ caused quite a stir in the first year of the new century. In March and August 1901, the 12/16 hp and 8/11 hp sister models appeared. Jellinek’s orders stretched the Daimler plant in Cannstatt to full production capacity.

‘Mercedes’ was lodged as a trade name on June 23, 1902 and legally registered on September 26. Although DMG now had a successful trade name, it still lacked a characteristic trademark. The company founder’s two sons, Paul and Adolf Daimler, now in charge of the business, remembered that their father, Gottlieb Daimler, had once marked a star above his own house, saying that one day it would shine over his factory symbolizing prosperity. From 1910 onwards, the three-pointed star began to appear at the front of the cars as a design feature on the radiator. The three-pointed star symbolizes Daimler’s ambition of universal motorization – “on land, on water and in the air”. It became a registered trademark in August 1923.

In June 1926, the two oldest motor manufacturers DMG and Benz & Cie. merged to form Daimler-Benz AG and at this point a new trademark was designed. The world renowned three-pointed star belonging to Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft was surrounded with its trade name ‘Mercedes’ as well as that of ‘Benz’, whose laurel wreath entwined the two names together. This trademark, which has changed little over the decades, still adorns Mercedes-Benz vehicles and has come to represent quality and safety on roads everywhere. Throughout the world the name Mercedes-Benz is synonymous with tradition, innovation and the future of the automobile.