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Wagamama number one Top High Street Food & Drink Chain

By James Russell: Wagamama number one Top High Street Food & Drink Chain

December 16, 2013

The Activate Solutions Group has announced key findings from its High Street Happiness Survey, looking into the levels of customer satisfaction being provided by the UK’s top high street brands.

Using 60 XCell field agents the survey reached 10 high streets across the country over a 2 week period, incorporating brands from 14 different sectors. A net promoter scoring system was used to measure factors relating to the sites themselves, the level of service being provided and the emotional response customers had to the experience overall.

Top 50 brands includes 16 Food & Drink chains

By using the recommendation ranking, which incorporates all other elements of the survey, Activate was able to identify the top 50 high street brands, 16 of which were national food and drink chains.

Restaurant rankings

Wagamama triumphed, coming top of the restaurants sector and ranking number 1 in the top 50 brands list.

Simon Cope, International Marketing and Property Director Wagamama said:

“The importance of the Wagamama brand and our great pan-Asian food to our consumers and teams remains at the forefront of everything we do, and we are humbled that Wagamama is at the top amongst so many other great brands”

Nando’s came second in the category and achieved number 5 overall. Pizza Express and Pizza Hut Restaurants also made it into the top 50, coming in at numbers 14 and 27.

Cafes

Pret A Manger came top of the cafes, ranking at number 4 overall. Nero followed close behind, coming second in the category and achieving 6th place overall. West Cornwall Pasty Company (7th), Greggs (9th), Costa (33rd) and Starbucks (40th) also featured.

Bars and pubs

Harvester reached 8th place, making it sector leader in the bars and pubs category. Wetherspoons (12th), Yates’s (22nd) and Toby Carvery (28th), also gained recognition.

Fast food

KFC was the highest ranking fast food outlet, achieving 19th place overall. Burger King also made it into the top 50, coming in at number 41.

The research

Using 60 XCell field agents the survey reached 10 high streets across the country over a 2 week period, incorporating brands from 14 different sectors. A net promoter scoring system was used to measure factors relating to the sites themselves, the level of service being provided and the emotional response customers had to the experience overall.

The research was conducted using The Activate Solutions Group’s new XCell data collection service, which gives retailers and service providers the ability to audit customer experiences across all retail, service and online sites in any sector nationwide.

The food and drinks sector did well

Mike Cottman, CEO of The Activate Solutions Group, comments: “Our survey was designed to show where the weaknesses and strengths lie on the Great British high street.

“While there is always room for improvement, overall the food and drinks sector did well. Restaurants came top; with cafes 4th and bars and pubs in 5th place. Fast food outlets overall have a lot more work to do, having achieved 11th place out of the 14 sectors we looked at.

“We all know consumers these days demand a lot more from their high street experiences and it’s up to all of us to ensure we’re doing everything we can to meet their ever increasing expectations. Tracking data of this type is the best way to tackle this.”

The 14 categories into which the top 50 brands fall

The top 50 brands identified by the research fall into the following categories (listed in ranked order according to the results):

  1. Restaurants
  2. Jewellers
  3. Newsagents & stationers
  4. Cafes
  5. Bars/Pubs
  6. Mobile
  7. Banks
  8. Charity shops
  9. Beauty
  10. Petrol
  11. Fast food outlets
  12. Discounters
  13. Convenience
  14. Clothes

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