Large family car
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A large family car is a European classification of cars which are larger than a small family car and smaller than an executive car. Examples of popular large family cars are the Ford Mondeo, Opel Vectra, Renault Laguna and Volkswagen Passat. Models designed by luxury car manufacturers are also called compact executive cars or simply compact executives, while a multi-purpose vehicle based on a large family car is called a large MPV. Equivalently sized cars in North America are usually called mid-size cars; the term "family car" is fairly often used to refer to a vehicle in this class. Examples include the Ford Fusion, Chevrolet Malibu and the Buick LaCrosse.
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Current large family cars are between 4.60 m and 4.75 m in the case of models from mainstream automakers, and between 4.50 m and 4.60 m in the case of premium marques. The most popular body styles are sedan / saloon, station wagon / estate, liftback, coupé and convertible; hatchbacks are extremely rare.
As it happened with executive cars in the late 1980s and early 1990s, mainstream large family cars are declining in sales, with many buyers preferring to downsize to high-spec versions of small family cars such as the Ford Focus or Vauxhall/Opel Astra, or to compact executive cars like the Audi A4, BMW 3 Series and Mercedes-Benz C-Class. Ironically, the large number of people seeking cars with a better image is slowly worsening the image of premium brands as they become less exclusive.
For their part, mainstream manufacturers as trying to push their image up market by removing liftback options, upping equipment and quality levels and boosting prices. Quite why a hatchback is seen as down market is not clear. One idea is that the less practical a car gets the more the owner can claim they do not need practicality as they can pay someone to garden, build, tidy and shop for them. The lack of estates in large luxury cars could be seen as evidence of this.
