We’re here today to raise awareness for luxury-car hood ornaments. As grille-mounted badges try to push hood ornaments into history, we stand tall with them—above the radiator, of course.

Nowhere is this a battle more clearly evident than at Mercedes-Benz. Despite having the most enviable logo in the automobile industry, the three-pointed star, Mercedes designers prefer to affix it to thick-ribbed grilles. Message: “We’re fresh! We’re sporty!” In previous decades, giant central stars were primarily fixed to Benz coupes and roadsters. Now every model has one, mood lighting optional. Only the C-, E-, and S-class models continue to sprout a hood ornament. But let’s be real, is there anything truly sporty about a non-AMG Mercedes sedan? If it were our money, we’d take the 2017 E-class in its most elegant form, with a badge-less, thin-lined chrome grille and a hood ornament reminding us, at every stint behind the wheel, how much we’d spent.

MODEL: 2017 Mercedes-Benz E300 4MATIC (base price: $55,575; as equipped: $63,895)

The new E300 is $950 cheaper than the outgoing E350. A 2.0-liter turbocharged four-cylinder replaces the 3.5-liter naturally-aspirated V-6, so power is down significantly from 302 horsepower to 241, yet the 273 lb-ft of torque remains the same, but is delivered at lower revs. A lower curb weight and two more gears (the automatic is a nine-speed) will help offset that power deficit, but we still expect that the E300 won’t be as quick as the E350. But let’s talk price: We’ve configured our E300 (the 2017 AMG E43 and E400 pricing is not out yet) to be representative of what you’ll actually find in dealer inventory. This is a car that will lease for $600 a month—the sweet spot for mid-size luxury sedans—and is very well equipped.

We opted for the all-wheel-drive 4MATIC, which adds $2500 over the rear-wheel-drive E300, because it’s useful to have in winter weather. And if we haven’t made it clear by now, we chose the Luxury trim—to get the traditional grille and hood ornament—which is technically free but now requires the $1900 Air Body Control suspension. So it’s really not free (before, there was no cost difference between the Sport and Luxury trims). Besides the hood ornament, the Luxury trim comes with softer dampers, extra chrome trim, smaller (17-inch) wheels, and a dash covered in MB-Tex, the fake leather that actually looks and feels like real Mercedes leather. That’s also the standard upholstery for the eight-way power seats, which feature memory and adjustable lumbar support.

There’s a huge chunk of additional standard equipment in the new car versus the 2016 E350. Navigation with three years of map updates on the 12.3-inch central screen, an upgraded COMAND infotainment system with touch-sensitive controls on the steering wheel, push-button start, 64 colors of LED ambient lighting, LED headlamps, Dynamic Select driving modes, an electric parking brake, a fold-down rear seat, power-folding mirrors, remote start, and a second USB port. Forward collision alert with automatic braking, an early version of vehicle-to-vehicle networking that sounds warnings from other E-class drivers, and PRE-SAFE Sound (which emits “pink noise” during a crash to protect ears) are all standard.

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