Roy Morgan survey highlights rural Australia’s most trusted and distrusted brands

Banks have received brickbats from regional Australians in a new survey which reveals the most trusted and distrusted brands.

Commonwealth Bank and Westpac have been given a collective thumbs down by farmers in a survey of trusted brands.

More than 1200 farmers nationwide were surveyed by Roy Morgan to determine the most trusted and distrusted brands across regional Australia.

Woolworths, Bunnings and Coles scored the gold, silver and bronze medals for overall trust while most banks got a whack from farmers still scarred by the 2000s credit crunch.

Roy Morgan chief executive Michele Levine said the supermarkets also scored strongly with the general population in a survey that included urban and rural respondents.

“It is noticeable that the scores for those three bands (Woolworths, Bunnings and Coles) are lower for farmers than the general population,” she said.

“On the other hand, some brands like Toyota are more trusted among farmers than the general populations. Farmers distrust Facebook slightly less than the average Australian and distrust Telstra slightly more than the average Australian.”

Ms Levine said call centre service and a lack of understanding about economic pressures were cited as reasons for distrusting the big banks.

She said a separate questionnaire on agribusiness brands found Elders was a top scorer.

“It seems for farmers that Elders is synonymous with the agribusiness industry,” she said.

“Nutrien and CRT rounded out the top three. (Farmers surveyed said) Elders provided excellent service in their livestock enterprise as well as in real estate.”

Australian farmers gave the Commonwealth Bank a poor report card in a recent Roy Morgan survey. Pic Annette Dew

Ms Levine said Westpac, Commonwealth Bank, Fonterra and Monsanto all scored poorly in the farmer trust survey.

“NAB is the agribusiness bank most trusted by Australian farmers. Rural Bank, a subsidiary of Bendigo Bank, is the second-most trusted, followed by Rabobank,” Ms Levine said.

Farmers surveyed said: “CBA doesn’t always do the right thing by agriculture in difficult times,” she said.

Survey respondents also said: “CBA’s closure of branches in regional Australia is forcing people online and Westpac doesn’t support rural industries.

Ms Levine said brand trust and distrust had long term impacts on the bottom line of retailers, financiers and service providers.

“Distrust can destroy a brand’s reputation. AMP was once a trusted, iconic brand but since the disastrous reputational damage of the Royal Commission, it’s lost 82 per cent of its market value.

“But it’s not just AMP. Facebook, Rio Tinto, Harvey Norman and more recently Optus and Medibank are all examples of company’s whose market value, revenue and leaderships have been materially impacted by brand shock.”