Chick-fil-A Leads Fast Food Industry in 2013 Temkin Experience Ratings

We recently released the 2013 Temkin Experience Ratings that ranks the customer experience of 246 companies across 19 industries based on a survey of 10,000 U.S. consumers. Here are highlights from the fast food industry:

• The average rating for fast food industry places it at number two out of 19 industries, only behind grocery chains.
• The average rating for the fast food industry increased from 74.0% in 2012 to 76.3% in 2013.
• Chick-fil-A is the top scoring fast food chain for the second straight year, with a rating of 82%. That score puts the fast food chain at #3 across all industries. It also earned the top marks for functional and emotional components in fast foods.
• Three other fast food chains are in the top 10 in the overall ratings; Dunkin’ Donuts, Little Caesar’s, and Sonic Drive-In are all tied at #7.
• Arby’s earned the top rating for the accessible component.
• KFC is the lowest-ranked fast food chain with a rating of 67%. That’s four points below the next lowest rated fast food chain, McDonalds.
• Hardees showed the largest improvement between 2012 and 2013, gaining 10 percentage points. Next on the list, Jack in the Box increased nine percentage points and Domino’s increased eight percentage points.
• While no firm declined by very much, three fast food chains dropped three percentage points between 2012 and 2013: Starbucks, Taco Bell, and KFC.
• Here’s a link to industry results from the 2012 ratings.

Download entire dataset for $395

Report: Net Promoter Score Benchmark Study, 2012

We just published a Temkin Group report, Net Promoter Score Benchmark Study, 2012. It provides NPS data on 180 U.S. companies across 19 industries. Here’s the executive summary:

USAA took the top two spots for its banking and insurance businesses while HSBC came in at the bottom for banking and credit cards. Our analysis of differences across consumer demographic segments showed that NPS tends to go up with age, doesn’t vary much by income levels, and is often highest with Asians. We also asked consumers what would make them more likely to recommend the companies and found that promoters are more likely to select lower prices and detractors are more likely to select better customer service. While there is some debate about the efficacy of NPS, our analysis shows that promoters are much more likely than detractors to purchase more in the future across all industries. To help you implement a successful NPS program, we’ve included eight tips such as don’t believe in an “ultimate question” and use control charts, not pinpointed goals.

Download report for $295
(includes the data)

The industries included in this report are airlines, auto dealers, banks, computer makers, credit card issuers, fast food chains, grocery chains, health plans, hotel chains, insurance carriers, Internet service providers, investment firms, major appliance makers, parcel delivery services, rental car agencies, retailers, software firms, TV service providers, and wireless carriers.

The report contains the following components:

• NPS for 180 companies across 19 industries
• NPS differences based on age, income, and ethnicity of consumers
• Improvement areas selected by promoters and detractors by industry
• Connection between NPS and future purchases by industry
• Eight tips for implementing a successful NPS program

Download report for $295
(Includes the data)

The bottom line:  Companies need to give customers a reason to recommend them

Chick-fil-A Customers Are Young, Wealthy, Educated, And Healthy

Chick-fil-A has been in the news lately because of the company’s stance on gay marriage. Don’t worry, I’m not going to use this blog as a sounding board for that controversy. But all of that attention made me think about Chick-fil-A. It’s quite a fast food company. Compared with other fast food companies that we’ve examined, Chick-fil-A is:

• Tied for 1st place in 2012 Temkin Experience Ratings with Starbucks and Subway
• 1st place in 2012 Temkin Forgiveness Ratings
• 1st place in 2012 Temkin Trust Ratings
• 1st place in 2012 Temkin Customer Service Ratings
• Tied for 1st place in 2012 Temkin Loyalty Ratings with Starbucks

Consumers seem to really love Chick-fil-A. So I took a look at their customers along with Burger King, KFC, McDonald’s, and Wendy’s. As the title of this blog states, Chick-fil-A customers are the youngest, wealthiest, most educated, and healthiest.

The bottom line: Politics aside, there’s no denying Chick-fil-A’s popularity

Report: 2012 Temkin Loyalty Ratings

Access the data from all Temkin Ratings research at the Temkin Ratings website.

We just published a new Temkin Group report, 2012 Temkin Loyalty Ratings. The report analyzes feedback from 10,000 U.S. consumers to rate their loyalty to 206 organizations across 18 industries. Congratulations to the top firms in this year’s ratings: Sam’s Club, Aldi, USAA, Publix, credit unions, and Amazon.com.

We added six industries (fast food chains, grocery chains, major appliances, car rental agencies, auto dealers, and parcel delivery services) and 63 companies compared with the 2011 Temkin Loyalty Ratings.

Here is the executive summary from the report:

Sam’s Club, Aldi, and USAA earned the top spots in the 2012 Temkin Loyalty Ratings while Citigroup (banking and credit cards) and Charter Communications (TV service and Internet service) each show up twice in the bottom four. We asked 10,000 U.S. consumers to rate their loyalty to companies across three dimensions: likely to recommend, reluctant to switch, and willing to repurchase. Their responses allowed us to rate the loyalty of customers to 206 companies across 18 industries. One-quarter of companies have “strong” or “very strong” ratings while 50% have “weak” or “very weak” ratings. At an industry level, grocery chains and retailers have the most loyal customers while internet service providers and TV service providers have the least loyal customers. USAA has the most loyal customers across three industries, banking, insurance, and credit cards. When comparing the results from the 2011 and 2012 Temkin Loyalty Ratings, we find that PNC and USAA improved the most and Kohl’s and Hyatt declined the most.

Download report for $195

The Temkin Loyalty Ratings are based on evaluating three components of loyalty:

1. Recommending: How likely are consumers to recommend the company to friends and colleagues?
2. Switching: How reluctant are consumers to switch business away from the company?
3. Repurchasing: How willing are customers to purchase additional products and services from the company?

Here are the ratings for all 206 companies:

Here’s how the industries compare with each other:

Here are some other highlights from the research:

• USAA (in their banking and credit card divisions) as well as credit unions (banking) outpaced their industry peers by more than 25 percentage points.
• DHL and RadioShack are the furthest behind their peers, falling more than 20 percentage points below their industry averages.
• Across the 12 industries we examined in both years, nine earned higher loyalty scores in 2012 and three showed a decline. Computer makers are at the top of the list of gainers while retailers had the largest decline.
• Of the 139 companies that are included in both the 2011 and 2012 Temkin Loyalty Ratings, 84 firms made at least a small improvement in their scores. Led by PNC and USAA, 19 companies earned double-digit improvements over the last year.
• Kohl’s and Hyatt are the only companies that declined by more than 10 percentage points over the previous year.

Download report for $195

Do you want to see the data? Go to the Temkin Ratings website where you can sort through all of the results for free. You can even purchase the underlying data if you want to get more access.

The bottom line: Consumer loyalty remains up for grabs across most industries.

Chick-fil-A, Starbucks, and Subway Are CX Leaders in Fast Food

This post examines the 17 fast food chains included in the 2012 Temkin Experience Ratings.

Chick-fil-A, Starbucks, and Subway earned the top customer experience ratings in the industry and are tied for third spot across all 206 companies. The three leading fast food chains are the only ones in the industry to earn “excellent” customer experience ratings. Eleven of the 17 fast food chains earned “good” ratings while the bottom three—Hardees, Domino’s, and Jack in the Box—earned “okay” ratings.

The overall fast food industry earned the second spot out of 18 industries, slightly behind grocery chains but well ahead of other industries.

Other highlights from the research include:

• Starbucks and Subway received the highest Functional ratings while Domino’s and Jack in the Box received the lowest.
• Subway received the highest Accessible ratings while Hardees and Jack in the Box received the lowest.
• Chick-fil-A and Starbucks received the highest Emotional ratings while Hardees received the lowest.

Do you want to see the data? Go to the Temkin Ratings website where you can sort through all of the results for free. You can even purchase the underlying data if you want to get more access.

The bottom line: Most fast food chains deliver solid CX

Report: 2012 Temkin Experience Ratings

Access the data from all Temkin Ratings research at the Temkin Ratings website.

We just published a new report, 2012 Temkin Experience Ratings. The report analyzes feedback from 10,000 U.S. consumers to rate 206 organizations across 18 industries. Congratulations to the top firms in this year’s ratings: Sam’s Club, Publix, Starbucks, Subway, Chick-fil-A, Aldi, Winn-Dixie, H.E.B, and credit unions.

We added six industries (fast food chains, grocery chains, major appliances, car rental agencies, auto dealers, and parcel delivery services) and 63 companies compared with the 2011 Temkin Experience Ratings.

Here is the executive summary from the report:

Sam’s Club and Publix earned the top two spots in the 2012 Temkin Experience Rankings, with three fast food chains rounding out the top five. We asked 10,000 U.S. consumers to rate their recent interactions with companies across three dimensions of their experience: functional, accessible, and emotional. Their responses allowed us to rate 206 companies across 18 industries. Only 28% of those companies received at least a “good” rating. Grocery chains earned the highest average scores and health plans dominated the bottom of the ratings. Kaiser Permanente and credit unions most outperformed their industries while DHL and RadioShack fell the farthest behind their peers. None of the companies earned an “excellent” rating for the emotional component, while Charter Communications and Earthlink lead 10 companies falling below the “very poor” threshold in that area. Compared with last year’s ratings, most industries improved, led by a 5.3 point average increase by insurance carriers. When it comes to changes over the past year by individual firms, PNC and Lenovo improved the most while Regions Bank had the sharpest decline.

Download report for FREE

The Temkin Experience Ratings are based on evaluating three elements of experience:

1. Functional: How well do experiences meet customers’ needs?
2. Accessible: How easy is it for customers to do what they want to do?
3. Emotional: How do customers feel about the experiences?

Here are the ratings for all 206 companies:

Here’s how the industries compare with each other:

Here are the companies that are leaders across the 18 industries:

Download report for FREE

Do you want to see the data? Go to the Temkin Ratings website where you can sort through all of the results for free. You can even purchase the underlying data if you want to get more access.

The bottom line: Customer experience is improving, but there’s a long way to go

They Really FU At The Drive Thru

One of the lines that I always remember in Lethal Weapon 2 is when Leo Getz (Joe Pesci) tells Martin Riggs (Mel Gibson) that ”They f*** you at the drive through.” It turns out that Pesci was right in his assessment of fast food experiences. According to a new report from QSR Magazine, here’s how often fast food restaurants give customers what they ordered in a drive through.

My take: First of all, congrats to Chick-fil-A which actually came out on top of QSR’s overall analysis. The fast food restaurant made a mistake in less than 1 out of 25 customer orders. The big burger chains, McDonalds, Burger King, and Wendy’s, got it wrong for about 1 in 10 customers while KFC, Checkers, and Popeyes messed up about 1 in 7 orders.

I can’t imagine running any business where 1 out of 10 of my customers (or more) didn’t get what they ordered. That’s terrible! Any company should, at a minimum, consistently give customers what they pay for. It doesn’t take any customer research to realize that this is an incredibly important (and broken)  moment of truth.

The bottom line: Check what’s in your bag before you drive away.