I鈥檝e been trying to get a Mercedes-Benz into my family鈥檚 fleet for some time, but the luxury brand鈥檚 offerings usually come in a little higher than our car-shopping budget allows. 30,000 sedan could work for my family of three, but quickly determined the four-door 鈥渃oupe鈥?was not intended for families, even small ones. My scheming started again with the 2015 GLA-Class. 32,225 including a destination charge, than in the Mercedes-Benz C-Class car. On paper, the Mercedes GLA250 offers more passenger room and cargo space than the CLA250 thanks to its SUV crossover body style. It鈥檚 no surprise that the GLA250鈥檚 cargo area is larger at 17.2 cubic feet behind the backseat compared to the CLA250鈥檚 13.1 cubic feet. My child鈥檚 stroller fit in the GLA250鈥檚 cargo area easily, but in the Mercedes-Benz CLA250 I had to remove one of the stroller鈥檚 wheels to fit it. When the GLA250鈥檚 60/40-split rear seats are folded, there鈥檚 43.6 cubic feet of vehicle cargo space.

I鈥檝e been trying to get a Mercedes-Benz into my family鈥檚 fleet for some time, but the luxury brand鈥檚 offerings usually come in a little higher than our car-shopping budget allows. 30,000 sedan could work for my family of three, but quickly determined the four-door 鈥渃oupe鈥?was not intended for families, even small ones. My scheming started again with the 2015 GLA-Class. 32,225 including a destination charge, than in the Mercedes-Benz C-Class car. On paper, the Mercedes GLA250 offers more passenger room and cargo space than the CLA250 thanks to its SUV crossover body style. It鈥檚 no surprise that the GLA250鈥檚 cargo area is larger at 17.2 cubic feet behind the backseat compared to the CLA250鈥檚 13.1 cubic feet. My child鈥檚 stroller fit in the GLA250鈥檚 cargo area easily, but in the Mercedes-Benz CLA250 I had to remove one of the stroller鈥檚 wheels to fit it. When the GLA250鈥檚 60/40-split rear seats are folded, there鈥檚 43.6 cubic feet of vehicle cargo space.

The GLA250 also boasts an additional 6 inches of rear vehicle legroom (33.9 inches) over the CLA250, which is impressive considering both cars have the same 106.3-inch wheelbase. The GLA250 SUV is no AMG, but it is fun to drive. However, it doesn鈥檛 have the same heft and solidity on the road as other vehicles in the Mercedes lineup. At times, the seven-speed dual-clutch transmission shifted harshly and hunted for the right gear. Coupled with the engine鈥檚 jarring stop-start technology, the driving experience was much less refined than other Mercedes-Benz model vehicles I鈥檝e driven in the past. My family noticed the GLA250鈥檚 roominess during our test drive. One of the biggest differences is in the backseat: Mercedes鈥?GLA250 has 35.4 inches of rear headroom 鈥?a 3-inch increase over the CLA250 鈥?thanks to its taller height of 60 inches. The additional headroom makes the Mercedes luxury crossover SUV a lot less claustrophobic and helps when installing a child-safety seat. However, my daughter had a difficult time getting out of the Mercedes-Benz crossover because her car seat filled a large portion of the backseat 鈥?just as it did in the CLA-Class.

When my husband rode with us and slid the front passenger seat back to a comfortable position, my daughter had only a narrow space to slink out of the car seat. To remedy this, my husband either had to slide the front seat forward before unstrapping her or she had to exit the car on the opposite side. When my husband stayed home, my daughter and I had no problems getting her in and out of her car seat. While I can鈥檛 exactly call the GLA-Class spacious, its close quarters weren鈥檛 a deal-breaker for me like they were in the CLA-Class coupe. However, I鈥檝e decide the GLA250 doesn鈥檛 work for my family because of two things: visibility and price. When in Reverse, I couldn鈥檛 see a thing out of the back of the Mercedes-Benz SUV from the driver鈥檚 seat. 550), but it鈥檚 almost a crime it doesn鈥檛 come standard at this price point. I relied on the system heavily as well as the backup camera, and even then I still had a few close calls. 45,935. That price tag doesn鈥檛 justify the excuses I鈥檇 be making for the Mercedes-Benz GLA250 SUV on a daily basis while on family duty.

However, it's still a step below some of its siblings. There are definitely more hard plastic pieces of trim in the GLA than you'll find in higher-end Mercedes models and even vehicles of a similar price. It generally lacks that sense of overengineered specialness we expect from cars festooned with that three-pointed star. In terms of technology, though, we have consistently found the GLA's iteration of Mercedes' COMAND electronics interface to be pleasantly easy to use. There is some learning curve, but the redundant dash-mounted buttons paired with the central screen and rotary controller make accomplishing both simple and complicated tasks easy. You don't need to wheel and click through multiple menus just to select a radio preset, for instance: Just press a number on the phone-style pad. What Features Come Standard? All told, that's a pretty solid standard features list given its price. Our test car included the popular Premium package that adds dual-zone automatic climate control, heated seats and a Harman Kardon audio system with satellite radio and an iPod interface.