When it was launched in 2005, nobody expected the Citroën C6 to top the sales charts. Nevertheless, they may have expected it to have a better stab at extending the ‘quirky big Citroën’ lineage that extended back to 1934. After all, the CX had reached an impressive production total of 1,170,645 units in its 23 years, and its XM successor managed a respectable 333,775 in less than half the time. The C6 was certainly quirky enough and had the right levels of comfort, but just 23,384 were built in seven years. What went wrong?
In short, the Germans happened. You have to admire Citroën for having a go – mainstream manufacturers such as Ford, Vauxhall, Renault and Peugeot had all pulled out of the executive saloon sector, leaving Mercedes-Benz, BMW…