Mercedes Benz has made it official: the 2011 C-Class Coupe is on its way. The German luxury automaker has announced it will build the two-door C-Class at its massive Bremen plant, with production scheduled to begin in 2011. The addition of the Coupe gives Mercedes Benz three different variants of the C-Class, with a convertible almost certainly to follow. The impressively flexible Bremen plant, which employs 12,600 workers, also makes the C-Class sedan, wagon, GLK, two E-Class variants, the SL and SLK.

With the C-Class Coupe officially on its way to production, we're more than a bit curious as to how Mercedes will differentiate the smaller Benz two-door from the larger, more expensive E-Class Coupe. See, the bi-door E-Class already utilizes the C-Class platform, and the more expensive E Coupe is almost identical in every dimension to the C-Class Saloon. But the E-Class coupe commands a price premium of $9,000 compared to a C-Class sedan with the same 3.5-liter V6 engine.

We suspect Mercedes will shorten the C-Class platform to better differentiate the C Coupe from the larger, more expensive E Coupe. But unlike the larger E Coupe, which is virtually the same price as sedan with the same name, the C Coupe may receive a bit of a price bump compared to its sedan brethren. It's a good bet that we'll know a lot of these answers by the time the Paris Motor Show opens its doors to the media in September. Hit the jump to read over the official press release.





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