John Lewis tops UK’s brand health ranking for the second year in a row

John Lewis has taken the top spot of YouGov’s UK brand health rankings for the second year in a row.

YouGov recently released its annual BrandIndex brand health rankings, which measures the perceptions of a brand‘s quality, value, impression, satisfaction and reputation.

Major retailers John Lewis and Marks & Spencer were first and third respectively on the UK list, while Swedish furniture giant Ikea made an appearance at fifth place and was one of two new entrants in the top 10.

Meanwhile, online retail giant Amazon and health and beauty retailer Boots were ranked seventh and 10th respectively.

Grocery brand staples Heinz and Cathedral City came in at fourth and eighth respectively, with the latter being the second new entrant.

“Over the past year the retail sector has struggled to combat problems arising from ferocious online competition and increased business costs,” YouGov head of brands Amelia Brophy said.

“However, in the face of this, the public clearly retains an affection for traditional high street brands with long and rich histories, such as John Lewis and Marks and Spencer.

“Similarly, while the BBC has faced challenging headlines over the past 12 month. But the public clearly still rates what the corporation offers and iPlayer and BBC One continue to be in strong brand health.”

YouGov also analysed where the biggest increases in UK brand health have come in the past year.

It found that for several brands, escaping negative press coverage has seen an improvement in their scores, although many of them still remain in negative territory.

Sports Direct was the most improved brand this year, after its score improved by 6.2 points, moving from -12.4 to -6.2.

YouGov said that while in past years sportswear giant has garnered negative press, it has enjoyed a period out of the headlines and its score has now returned to mid-2016 levels.

Value fashion chain Primark was the other retailer to have made a notable leap in the past year – going from having negative brand health to positive.

Its  score improved from -0.9 to 2.7 in the last 12 months, an improvement of 3.6 points.

On a global scale, Google retained its position at the top of the BrandIndex brand health rankings.

The only retailers to have made the top 10 global list are Amazon, Ikea, Uniqlo and Lego, which were ranked sixth, seventh, ninth and 10th respectively.

Ikea, Uniqlo and Lego were also new entrants to the top 10.

While it’s often associated as a phone manufacturer, Samsung also has a direct-to-consumer division and was ranked third on the global list.

YouGov said its BrandIndex brand health rankings were drawn from over 1.46 million interviews in the UK conducted between July 2017 and June 2018, while for the global rankings it conducted over six million interviews over the 12 months to the end of June.

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