Tiffany Moore – Mercedes-Benz USA

The first time Tiffany Moore walked through a Mercedes-Benz research and development facility, she stopped in front of an S580e engine and watched the engineers around it. They hovered close, adjusting, checking, refusing to let anything pass without scrutiny. It reminded her of another room she once knew well, one filled with federal agents building a case they could not afford to get wrong.

Tiffany Moore | Mercedes-Benz USA | Associate General Counsel

That instinct for precision, carried over from a decade spent prosecuting complex cases for the U.S. Department of Justice, now defines how Moore operates as associate general counsel for dealer network and franchise matters at Mercedes-Benz USA.

One of the world’s most recognizable luxury automotive brands, Mercedes-Benz traces its heritage to the invention of the automobile itself. Supporting that legacy requires a complex network of dealer relationships, franchise agreements, and business partnerships, areas where Moore helps guide the legal framework behind the company’s sales, service, and customer experience across the country.

A career built on litigation

Moore’s path to Mercedes began far from a car dealership. After earning a degree in economics from Spelman College and a JD from the University of Georgia School of Law, she joined a private practice for nearly two years, arriving just as the subprime mortgage collapse reshaped the legal landscape. From there, she clerked for more than two years with the U.S. District Court, an unusual sequence that let her watch assistant U.S. attorneys work a courtroom before she became one herself.

She spent more than 10 years as an AUSA in Atlanta, handling civil matters, complex criminal cases, and fraud, eventually working compassionate release petitions at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I was a general litigator, then I did a clerkship, which was transformative to my practice,” Moore says.

Prosecution, she explains, tends to belong to attorneys early in their careers, hungry for the grind of the courtroom. Stay too long, and the work can wear a person down, dulling the edge that made the job meaningful in the first place. Moore credits the dynamic MBUSA attorney who hired her, a former judge who placed enormous weight on technical skill, with shaping the rigor she still carries into every matter. The discomfort baked into litigation, she says, is where the real learning happens, and more than anything, the job taught her how to talk to people from every walk of life, a skill that now serves her well as she works with dealer principals, business leaders, and colleagues across Mercedes-Benz USA.

Finding a home at Mercedes-Benz

Moore joined Mercedes-Benz in May 2022 as Corporate Counsel focusing on defending MBUSA in high-stakes products liability and class action matters, stepping into a very different world than the one she left. Her litigation experience proved particularly valuable as she began supporting a global brand operating in one of the nation’s most heavily regulated industries.

“I’m not afraid of the necessary conversations, complicated disputes, or challenging legal issues. That’s where my litigation background has proven most valuable,” Moore says.

The dealer partners she works with now are incredibly sophisticated and well-resourced, often publicly traded companies that play a critical role in representing the Mercedes-Benz brand and serving customers across the United States. The complex financial and criminal matters she once handled have given way to the equally demanding challenges of supporting a nationwide dealer network and luxury automotive brand.

In October 2024, Moore moved into her current role as associate general counsel for dealer network and franchise matters, supporting the MBUSA network team as well as other business units daily and working to remove obstacles that may arise and help dealers provide the service customers expect. She also helps evaluate new buyers and ownership changes, helping Mercedes-Benz maintain a strong retail network while navigating guarantees, incentives, and the patchwork of state franchise laws that can complicate growth and expansion.

The speed of the business

Adjusting to corporate life meant learning an entirely new rhythm. Where litigation moved at the pace of a court calendar, the auto industry moves at the pace of the market, and Moore says that shift remains her greatest ongoing challenge.

Supporting the Mercedes-Benz dealer network also gave her a new appreciation for the people running those businesses, which she describes as hyper-complicated organizations juggling mechanics, customers, employees, lending, and floorplan financing all at once.

“I remain in awe of our partners that operate our dealerships,” Moore says.

Mercedes-Benz USA’s legal team supports a wide range of business priorities, with Moore working closely with outside counsel to help manage the franchise work spread across nearly every state, as well as advising on the logistics of getting vehicles to dealers where they need them. Every decision, she says, gets filtered through the weight of the three-pointed star.

“Mercedes invented the automobile, and that is ingrained in everything we do,” Moore says.

That history shapes how she approaches even routine matters, from supply chain questions to production that has increasingly shifted to the United States. The brand cannot simply chase trends, she notes, because its legacy demands a higher standard at every turn. Transportation remains one of the most heavily regulated industries in the country, and Moore often leans on colleagues who have spent decades inside the business. Even the celebrity ambassadors and campaigns that come with representing the brand reinforce a standard that touches every corner of her legal work, down to the engineers she once watched fuss over an electric engine as if it were evidence in a trial.

Looking toward the future

Moore describes her role less as leading the charge and more as clearing the path for others to succeed.

“I’m part of the business team, but I’m on special teams instead of being the quarterback,” Moore says.

Still, she sees herself as integral to the outcome, someone who has to make the kick or the play when the moment calls for it. Having previously managed a team of roughly 25 people, she is now focused on deepening her expertise in corporate governance while continuing to support Mercedes-Benz USA’s business objectives and dealer network as the automotive industry evolves.

With young attorneys on her team, Moore emphasizes building foundational skills rather than shortcuts, even as tools like Copilot reshape how legal work gets done. Those tools, she says, are only as good as the prompt behind them, and no technology can replace the lessons learned from the trial-and-error grind of practicing law.

Outside the office, Moore is a mother to twin seven-year-old daughters, and she makes a point of spending as much time with them as her schedule allows, alongside her husband, whom she travels with when she can. She stays engaged in social and pro bono work, though public speaking commitments have slowed since the pandemic.

“You have to choose to be positive,” Moore says.

It is a philosophy that has carried her from federal courtrooms to dealership boardrooms, and one she continues to lean on as she helps support Mercedes-Benz USA’s business and dealer network. For Moore, the work at Mercedes-Benz USA offers a different kind of purpose, helping support a brand that has spent more than a century defining innovation, luxury, and customer experience on the road.