Public opinion of Harrods craters following claims against Al Fayed
Yougov’s chief executive Steve Hatch takes a closer look at the data behind the biggest stories in business.
On 19 September, the BBC aired a documentary in which more than 20 female ex-employees of Harrods made abuse allegations against Mohamed Al Fayed. Since the original broadcast, 200 more women have come forward with claims against the luxury department store’s former owner, who sold the company in 2010 to Qatar Holdings and died last year. Harrods managing director, Michael Ward, said Fayed “presided over a toxic culture of secrecy”, and has outright said the business “failed” its employees.
While the story is still unfolding, it has already had a stark impact on public perceptions of the upmarket store despite the change of ownership. Between 18 September and 29 September, measures tracking whether people have recently heard anything positive or negative about Harrods fell from 2.6 to -21.6 (-24.2), suggesting that the UK has taken notice of the story.
Over the same timeframe, Impression scores – which track positive and negative sentiment – declined from 13.5 to -11.4 (-24.9). This takes Harrods from a relatively well-respected brand to one the public firmly dislikes.
Perhaps inevitably, given the nature of the allegations, Reputation scores – which track whether consumers would be proud or embarrassed to work for a brand – have significantly dropped from 26.0 to 3.8 (22.2). Recommend scores, a measure of customer advocacy, have also plummeted from 7.8 to -5.7 (-13.5).
Summarising the overall impact on Harrods’ image, Index scores (a metric that averages several measures to paint a picture of general brand health) have slumped from 12.1 to -0.7 (-12.8) over the period we have covered.
The fallout of the BBC’s Fayed documentary raises questions over whether Harrods will be able to recover the prestige and trust it once enjoyed among the UK public. Even if there are no further developments in the scandal, the luxury department store may still have a mountain to climb to regain its former reputation.