It's a balance.
Most people can't have half a dozen vehicles, each one a dedicated tool that perfectly performs the needs of that day.
And everyone, not just Maslow, has a hierarchy of needs.
Some people value performance and handling higher than others. Some people value cargo capacity and rear passenger legroom higher than others. Some people value towing higher than others [many who value it not at all]. Some people value safety highest. Some people value cool factor highest. Etc etc etc.
Each of those people need to balance their needs with the exception.
I.e. if someone is a single person living in a small apartment, they might prefer a small sporty car that doesn't have tons of cargo room. In that case the "exception" is that anytime you need to haul something you're begging favors from someone with a truck or going and renting a truck, or you're spending extra money for delivery of items that you could have transported yourself if you'd bought a bigger vehicle.
For me, the top need is to have a family hauler. Literally my entire selection process was based around that as priority #1, and accomplishing that while avoiding driving a minivan was priority #2 lol... But my "exception" was that I have a fun car already, the Jeep. It was paid off and so all it costs me is registration/insurance money, so I didn't really worry about Nurburgring times for my family hauler.
SUVs are popular for a lot of reasons, but that they do a lot of things for a lot of uses is a big one...
