Donald Trump’s namesake company remained at the bottom of the list in the annual Axios-Harris survey of the brand reputations for the 100 most prominent companies in America.
The survey, released this week, compiles public opinion for each of the 100 companies named most frequently by participants in the survey; respondents were asked to name which two companies currently held the best and worst reputations among average Americans, for a total of four nominations; the individual responses were then aggregated into a list of the 100 most notable brands in the US.
When those 100 brands were ranked on a series of nine characteristics including workplace culture, business ethics and customer trust, the Trump Organization came dead last, behind bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX and other brands like Twitter and Spirit Airlines.
Other companies that made the list (and subsequently beat the Trump Organization, in reputational terms) included the recently bankrupt Bed, Bath & Beyond as well as Starbucks, currently under fire from the left for a wave of alleged union-busting efforts.
It was the second time in two years the Trump Organization has earned the title of the company with the worst reputation in America. It comes as the Trump business has sought to defend itself against persistent years-old allegations of fraudulent business practices, including the illegal inflation and deflation of asset values for the purpose of obtaining loans and paying taxes at more favourable rates.
New York’s attorney general, Letitia James, now seeks to bar the company from doing any business in the state that Donald Trump once called home, while the president himself faces a bevy of legal battles revolving around his own personal conduct as well. Last year, the company’s CFO Allen Weisselberg plead guilty to more than a dozen criminal charges, including tax fraud and the falsification of business records.
In recent years, the company has retreated from a flagship property in downtown Washington DC, where it operated a hotel inside the historic Old Post Office building throughout the Trump presidency which became a hotspot for both actual and wannabe members of the Trump inner circle.
