The arrival of the first Mercedes-Benz small van offering last year meant that Sprinter and Vito loyalists could — for the first time — satisfy their small van needs without being unfaithful to the three-pointed star.

This is a story that’s since played out in a number of fleets, including Belfast-based Montgomery Refrigeration, which specialises in providing installation and maintenance services for supermarkets.

The firm has operated Vito and Sprinter vans for many years, but had been forced to look elsewhere for its smaller vans.

However, Montgomery has now purchased 18 long-wheelbase Citan 109CDIs, to add to its fleet, meaning that the vast majority of the company’s 85-vehicle fleet now wear the Mercedes badge.

As  Michael Montgomery, the company’s Managing Director, explains, this offers a number of practical benefits:

“Our vans carry spare parts, tools and equipment but we need different sized vehicles for varying functions. Mercedes-Benz has always been our first choice as its vans are solid and dependable, well-liked by our engineers, and economical to operate. We’ve also been very well looked after by the dealer over the years.

“The introduction of the smaller Citan was a very welcome development – it means we can now source all our vans from a single supplier in which we have complete trust, and makes our lives easier because we now have a single point of contact for all our fleet requirements.”

The Renault Kangoo-based Citan has been well received by small and mid-sized fleet operators, and Montgomery isn’t the first company that’s bought the van on the strength of the performance of its larger siblings, as I’ve reported before.