Oh Lord, Won’t You Buy Me a Mercedes-Benz…Helicopter?!

If the price is right, most car companies will allow their logos to be slapped onto anything, even if it isn’t remotely automotive in nature. Not exactly Inside Baseball, we know, but it’s a fact that warrants repeating. And while most such branded tchotchkes are laughably useless, tacky enough to make your friends exchange nervous glances and, oh yeah, heinously overpriced, once in a while an item comes along that somehow manages to be indisputably soil-your-drawers awesome. The Eurocopter EC145 “Mercedes-Benz Style” helicopter falls into this latter category.

We hear you scoffing: “If I wanted a toy helicopter with Mercedes-Benz logos on it, I could make one myself by spending $100 at Toys ‘R’ Us and the parts counter at the local dealer!” We’re not going to argue with the brilliance of your diabolical plan, but we should point out that this particular co-branded whirlybird is an actual, full-size, honest-to-Igor helicopter that requires scores of hours of training and a license to fly. It will also cost a bit more than even the priciest radio-controlled miniature copter, though the actual price hasn’t been announced. What will you get for all that dough? Hit the jump and find out.

The EC145 “Mercedes-Benz Style” is propelled by a pair of turbine engines, and the exterior features a speedy German racing silver paint job with “Mercedes-Benz” lettering. Inside the Mercedes-Benz-designed cabin, buyers will have a number of seat upholstery materials and colors from which to choose, as well as a variety of woods for the floor and ceiling panels. (We can’t speak for everyone, but we say hardwood floors in your personal helicopter should be the new litmus test for determining whether you are or aren’t, as the kids in the ‘hood say, ballin’.) Other toys include reconfigurable seating, an air conditioned cubby for your bottles of bubbly, tables, a DVD player, LCD monitors, ambient lighting and a windowed partition between the cockpit and passenger cabin.

But are any of those things really important? Of course not; the important thing is that until we start seeing, say, Ferrari-branded private railroad cars or Bentley lending its name to McMansions sold in kit form (some assembly by serfs required), the EC145 “Mercedes-Benz Style” will be the most over-the-top automotive-branded non-automotive product under the sun. And that has to count for something, right?

Source: Eurocopter