Thing with the likes of Neoplan, Setra and the likes, they all produce some lovely bodies and used to (in the coach sense) be regarded as a premium brand then Setra pulled out of the RHD coach sector for the UK and Neoplan apart from the one body hasn't made inroads into the UK for a while, the also rans of Berkhof and Jonckheere have also pulled out from a coach sense apart from Berkhof with a few of their Long distance double deck coaches.
Jonckheere are now part of VDL, the later of which who went on a buying spree of a few other manufacturers in the past, such as Berkhof and Bova for example.
The most well known product of VDL these days is the Futura, which is an integral vehicle with the idea of taking the cheapness and decent profit margins and savings by being an integral of the Berkhof/Synergy and some of the styling of the Jonckheere and a little bit of additional flair. The Futura was intended to replace both the higher end Jonckheere JHV and the lower end Berkhof being a middle ground between the two. Unfortunately what you've got is a poor quality vehicle, with poor build quality that looks fairly nice.
The idea was that the JHV/SHV on Volvo chassis would be retired as it was expected that the premium customers would take a high spec version of the integral Futura. However this did not happen, following poor reviews for the Futura and in the end Volvo incentivised VDL to adapt the JHV/SHV product for the Volvo B11R for what is now the facelifted Jonckheere JHV2/SHV2 as Volvo considered the Jonckheere / Volvo combination as key to their coach chassis market share.
However there is likely to be no long term future for Jonckheere as a body on chassis builder for Volvo products as the profit margins on such vehicles is quite a bit less than the integral market and the facelifted JHV2/SHV2 was only an updated version of a former product as the result of Volvo themselves putting in time and money into supporting through fear of losing chassis market share.
Mercedes seem to have issues selling enough of the new models in this country as everyone seems to be preferring Wright, ADL or Optare, as for engines I remember a lot of the really early MAN stuff being fairly decent but then it went downhill fairly rapidly and they were certainly nowhere in the same regard as the much renowned and lauded Volvo B10.
Mercedes really doesn't seem interested in adapting many of their vehicles for the UK market. the Citaro and Tourismo serve as a one size fits all adaption to underpin their offering in UK, often covering prospective uses that there are specific products for elsewhere.
Mercedes Bus offerings in Western Europe are generally of a higher specification than we have here in the UK and can be considered premium vehicles so are not attractive from a price point of view. The Citaro is the best selling bus in the last decade or two Europe wide. Lately Mercedes have been willing to take the brand a little 'downmarket' by building lower spec interiors for the UK Market than they would have traditionally. Mainland Europe also has the Conecto, which is essentially cut down, version of the Citaro, aimed mostly at Central and Eastern Europe, which has never been converted to right hand drive. There's also the CapaCity, which is an ultra long articulated Citaro.
On the subject of Coaches, the Mercedes range is poorly represented in the UK, you only really have the Tourismo two axle or three axle and nothing else. Again Mercedes have offered some lower range specifications in the UK than traditionally offered elsewhere to make it a one size fits most coach. The Setra Range had three levels, TopClass (best of the best), ComfortClass (upper mid range / lower high end) and Multi-Class (buses, lower line coaches) and a lot more sophisticated options that the Tourismo doesn't have. We also haven't seen the lower end Intouro or Travego which are offered in Europe.
