- Gen Z and baby boomers are at odds when it comes to trusting brands.
- Data-intelligence company Morning Consult conducted thousands of interviews to get a sense of the companies consumers trust.
- Gen Z trusts tech giants like Google, Netflix, and Amazon.
- Boomers gravitate toward delivery services, food brands, and the Weather Channel.
- Sign up for Business Insider’s retail newsletter, The Drive-Thru.
- Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.
Once trust is gone, it’s gone. But there’s a major generational gap when it comes to what brands people choose to put their faith in.
Data-intelligence company Morning Consult conducted 16,700 interviews per brand for almost 2,000 brands. Each participant was asked “How much do you trust each brand to do what is right?” and given the options of “a lot,” “some,” “not much,” “not at all,” or “don’t know.” Morning Consult’s website says its trust ranking “is determined by share of ‘a lot’ responses.”
The survey found that the youngest and oldest consumers diverge sharply when it comes to how much they trust brands — and which brands they trust. Gen Z shoppers have an average brand trust rating of plus 10; less than the average boomer rating of plus 21.
And when it comes to the brands that they trust the most, Gen Z gravitates toward tech, ranking Google, Netflix, Amazon, YouTube, and Playstation as its top picks. Those rankings have no common ground with those of the baby boomers.
For older shoppers, the United States Postal Service delivers the most when it comes to trust. The federal mail service is followed closely by the United Parcel Service, Hershey, the Weather Channel, and Cheerios.
For their part, the age groups sandwiched between Gen Z and the boomers favor a mix of those companies. Millennials most trust Google, UPS, Amazon, Paypal, and Netflix. Gen X puts a lot of stock in USPS, Google, Amazon, Hershey, and Paypal.
“It’s no secret that trust is key to brand success,” Morning Consult CEO Michael Ramlet said in a statement. “In today’s climate, every single day presents leaders with the opportunity to cultivate reliability — a key driver of trust.”
