Poll crowns House of Fraser & Sports Direct among UK’s most loathed brands

A poll conducted by Money Saving Expert has crowned Sports Direct, Apple and House of Fraser among the UK’s top five most loathed retail brands.

While Mike Ashley’s sporting goods retailer made it to the number one spot, Money Saving Expert added that a social media campaign against the company – which recently acquired House of Fraser for a nominal fee immediately after it fell into administration – may have influenced the results.

The poll surveyed 7600 readers to rank 52 household brands in a Love or Loathe list.

The poll asked respondents to pick up to five brands they “love” and up to five retailers they “loathe”, out of a total of 52 options.

House of Fraser came in as the UK’s fourth most loathed retailer, with Apple and Currys/PC World making it to second and third position respectively.

Primark, Amazon, WHSmith, Tesco, Asda and Debenhams filled the rest of the top 10 most loathed retailers.

The top 10 most-loathed brands:

1. Sports Direct, with 2913 “loathe” votes (did not feature in the 2016 poll)
2. Apple, with 1557 “loathe” votes (4th in 2016)
3. Currys/PC World, with 1164 “loathe” votes (3rd in 2016)
4. House of Fraser, with 1052 “loathe” votes (31st in 2016)
5. Primark, with 971 “loathe” votes (1st in 2016)
6. Amazon, with 820 “loathe” votes (13th in 2016)
7. WHSmith, with 813 “loathe” votes (7th in 2016)
8. Tesco, with 787 “loathe” votes (2nd in 2016)
9. Asda, with 756 “loathe” votes (6th in 2016)
10. Debenhams, with 698 “loathe” votes (26th in 2016)

A spokesperson for Sports Direct said: “We don’t believe this poll is a true reflection of customer opinion.

“By contrast, Sports Direct was listed as number one in a top 10 of the most improved global brands published by the YouGov BrandIndex earlier this year.”

As for the UK’s most loved retail brainds, discounter Aldi was voted into the number one spot, behind Amazon at number two and John Lewis at number three.

The top three also remain unchanged from 2016, the last time Money Saving Expert conducted a poll of this kind.

Meanwhile M&S, Lidl, Ikea, Home Bargains, Ebay, Waitrose and Wilko were the rest of the household names to make it into the top 10.

The top 10 most-loved brands:

1. Aldi, with 2908 “love” votes (1st in 2016)
2. Amazon, with 2623 “love” votes (2nd in 2016)
3. John Lewis, with 1979 “love” votes (3rd in 2016)
4. M&S, with 1788 “love” votes (4th in 2016)
5. Lidl, with 1688 “love” votes (5th in 2016)
6. Ikea, with 1565 “love” votes (7th in 2016)
7. Home Bargains, with 1233 “love” votes (did not feature in 2016 poll)
8. Ebay, with 1,230 “love” votes (9th in 2016)
9. Waitrose, with 1180 “love” votes (6th in 2016)
10. Wilko, with 1167 “love” votes (8th in 2016)

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