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Gen Z's Most Loved Brands Report 2020

August 2020

Report summary

For more recent data and analysis, see the Gen Z's Favorite Brands Report.

The coronavirus pandemic has proven to be among the most far-reaching and trying event of our lifetimes. Almost overnight, it changed the way we live, work and interact with the world around us. Building on our fourth edition of Morning Consult's Most Loved Brands, we explore how the pandemic is transforming Gen Z's relationship with brands. Like the most-loved brands across all Americans, Gen Z's top brands range from companies that have always been there for us to industry disruptors who are meeting this moment and in doing so changing the way we live, work and entertain ourselves.

Key Takeaways

  • More than a quarter of Gen Z's Most Loved Brands are Food & Beverage brands – and nearly a fifth (18%) of Gen Z's Top 50 are Television, Music and Radio brands.
  • Gen Z has its own perspective on the Brand Love equation. There are 25 brands that Gen Z love which do not appear on the top 50 list for all adults. Gen Z as a generation especially loves brands offering entertainment, innovation, and an experience, but does have a soft spot for the nostalgia of certain legacy brands better known by their elders.
  • A recommendation from friends or family plays a role in Gen Zers' interest in or decision to purchase from a brand or company for the vast majority (86%).
  • Gen Z's 16 top drivers of Brand Love include functional fundamentals like reliability, reputation and availability, as well as emotional essentials like trust, ease of experience and quality – as well as two qualities which are unimportant to elder generations.
  • More than half (55%) of Gen Z says there are new brands or companies they have begun buying which they plan to continue buying after stay-at-home and social distancing measures end – and a similar share (56%) reports that there are brands or companies they are spending on which they don't miss and can live without.

Methodology

To determine this year’s rankings, Morning Consult analyzed over 150,000Morning Consult Brand Intelligence interviews with U.S. adults to measure consumer perceptions across four key metrics: favorability, trust, community impact, and Net Promoter Score. The final rankings were determined using surveys conducted online among a national sample of adults. Between 3,700 and 8,300 adults rated each of the over 1,900 companies from June through July 2020. The average company was surveyed over 6,000 times. The maximum margin of error for a given brand is plus or minus 3%.

The Most Loved Brands Index is based on four metrics, added together for an index score:

Favorability Score: The percentage of consumers with a favorable opinion of the brand.

Trust Score: The percentage of consumers who trust the brand to do the right thing.

Community Impact Score: The percentage of consumers who say the brand has a positive impact on their local community.

Net Promoter Score: Consumers are asked on a scale of 1-10 how likely they would be to promote a given brand. NPS is determined by subtracting the percentage who say 0-6 from the percentage who say 9 or 10.

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