Which firms have the best reputation among the UK public, and which are falling from grace?

John Harrington

April 15, 2016

How long?

2-3 minutes

Which firms have the best reputation among the UK public, and which are falling from grace?

Lego, IKEA and BMW Group are the firms with the best reputation among UK consumers, says new research that finds UK companies are increasingly falling behind their foreign counterparts in terms of reputation among the British public.

Lego: Tops the reputation list for UK consumers

The RepTrak study, which surveyed 50,000 people in the UK, also identified Airbus Group as the firm with the largest improvement in reputation between 2015 and 2016, while Volkswagen suffered by far the biggest decline following .

Companies were ranked out of 100, and 10 firms received an "excellent" rating of 80 per cent or more:

Lego Group
IKEA
BMW Group
Sony
Rolls-Royce Aerospace
Aston Martin
Rolex

Samsung

Bosch

Kellogg’s

According to the report by the Reputation Institute, UK companies are "losing out on reputation in their home market", with just two of the top 10 firms being UK-based. Home-domiciled companies make up just 26 per cent of the top 50 and 41 per cent of the top 150.

Just four UK firms received an excellent score: Rolls-Royce Aerospace (82.6 per cent), Aston Martin (82.1 per cent), ASOS (80.4 per cent) and Jaguar Land Rover (80.4 per cent).

Of the 27 firms that scored "poor" (below 40 per cent), all but two were UK or Ireland-based. UK companies ranked "poor" included five utilities and financial services companies, three transport companies and two gambling and telecoms companies.

Companies in the survey were scored according to their reputation across seven areas: products and services, innovation, workplace, governance, citizenship, leadership and performance.

Kasper Ulf Nielsen, Reputation Institute executive partner and co-founder, said: "The UK general public has a lower perception of UK companies across all seven dimensions of reputation, compared with international companies operating in the UK. This shows a lack of both emotional and rational connection that is unique to the UK. Across the world, home countries tend to have a stronger reputation, and this lack of reputation capital puts UK plc at a disadvantage in its home market."

Meanwhile, here are the companies with the biggest increases in their reputation scores compared with last year: