DETROIT -- Designer Ralph Lauren appears to have had a hand in -- of all things -- the next Ford Motor Co. minivan.

The boxy Ford Fairlane concept vehicle, which company officials say gives strong clues about where its minivan is going, probably started with a conversation company chairman Bill Ford had with the fashion guru, Mr. Ford says.

"Ralph loves cars and loves design and obviously has a lot of thoughts about it," Mr. Ford said. Mr. Lauren suggested Ford resurrect its Woody wagon, a 1930s and 1940s car named for exterior panels made of, well, wood. It was a family station wagon with a V-8 engine that generated a top speed of 235 kilometres an hour and was adopted by surfers, hot rodders and others "with a general disregard for conforming to the norm," according to auto website http://www.is-it-a-lemon.com.

"This is kind of a 21st-century Woody . . . and I think it's a very intriguing concept," Mr. Ford told reporters at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit.

There's a long timeline between the appearance of the Fairlane this week at the Detroit show and production of the next generation of Ford's minivan at the Oakville assembly complex in Oakville, Ont., in 2008, but senior executives are seeking ways to make their vehicle stand out from the crowd in what chief operating officer Jim Padilla calls a "saturated" market.

Mr. Padilla said yesterday that his daughter has a 2½-year-old daughter of her own and is pregnant with another child.

"She needs the interior space of a minivan, but she doesn't want to be caught dead in a soccer mom vehicle," he said. So she drives a Ford Escape sport utility vehicle.

Enter the Fairlane, which derives its name from company founder Henry Ford's estate not far from company headquarters in Dearborn, Mich., and stirs memories of one of the company's land yachts of the 1960s.

"We're reluctant to call it a minivan, but it certainly is a people mover," said Scott Strong, director of North America advanced design for Ford.

Minivan drivers like their vehicles, Mr. Strong said, but they dislike the stodgy image.

In the concept vehicle, the wood is kept inside the Fairlane, decorating trim panels on the door and support pillars and covering the instrument panel.

The sliding doors are gone, at least on the concept vehicle, replaced by so-called coach doors with the rear doors opening toward the tail of the vehicle.

The tailgate opens three ways -- left, right or up -- to show off a utility area with a refrigerator and a cutting surface.

It's unlikely those features will show up on the production version.

"We're being far more expressive and far more ambitious and far more risk-taking in floating some of these [ideas] forward because we're ready for that," Mr. Padilla said.

"Just to sit back and say we're going to do another minivan didn't make any sense to us because we think the market is saturated with that type of product and frankly you need a fresh start."

Ford spent $600-million on a fresh start two years ago with the Freestar replacing the previous version Windstar minivan at the Oakville assembly plant.

It has not lived up to expectations. The plant was shut down for several weeks last year and operated on only one shift in December instead of the usual two-shift operation.

"Ford is really struggling in the minivan segment right now," said Joe Barker, manager of North American sales analysis for consulting firm CSM Worldwide Inc. in Northville, Mich.

There's also some evidence that the minivan market as a whole is not as saturated as Mr. Padilla suggests.

Minivan sales fell in Canada last year to 184,614 from 198,977. Lower sales of the Freestar compared with the Windstar contributed to that decline.

But in the U.S. market, the destination for about 80 per cent of the Freestars assembled in Oakville, minivan sales rose 3 per cent to 1.11 million vehicles from 1.07 million in 2003, Mr. Barker said.

Most of the growth, however, was enjoyed by offshore-based companies, with sales rising for Kia Motors Inc., with its Sedona, Nissan Motor Co. Ltd. and its redesigned Quest and Toyota Motor Corp., with its Sienna.

DaimlerChrysler AG, which redesigned its segment-leading vehicles, also increased sales last year.