It sure couldn't cope with today's lifestyle!
People too lazy to pick up coins and rocks off the floor or go get attachments form the closet. First you would do floors, then set the cleaner up to do above-the-floor cleaning. Now it's just "rush to barely vacuum the floor and care less about the junk stuck in a crevice or dust in the curtains because I have better things to do in life", That is if modern people could be bother to vacuum at all! But any thread is fun when you throw a HOOVER in it! 
While I'd love to contribute to the original intentions of this thread, I cannot speak for market choices available "Across the pond", I'll let you two carry on to hopefully sell said client on a X__________!