Nestlé Ranked No. 5 On '100 Most Loved Companies' List

WASHINGTONAPCO Insight revealed its list of the 100 Most Loved Companies, with only two food and beverage companies to make the top 10Nestlé (No. 5) and Whole Foods (No. 8).

APCO used a proprietary Emotional Linking^SM model to measure consumers' emotional attachments to brands. The rankings are the result of a decade-long research project including a global survey of more than 600 of the world's largest corporate brands among more than 70,000 individuals in 15 key markets around the world.

The model evaluated eight emotions to provide companies a roadmap to understand  consumers' expectationsunderstanding, approachability, relevance, admiration, curiosity, identification, empowerment and pride.

Other food and beverage companies to make the Top 100 include Kellogg's (No. 12), Hershey's (13), Coca-Cola (14), Pepsico (17), Costco (20), General Mills (23), Subway (32), Dr. Pepper Snapple (41), Publix (43), Del Monte (50), Kroger (52), Campbell's (60), Tim Hortons (61), McDonald's (69), Heinz (75), Tyson (85), Mars, Inc. (91) and Starbucks (96).

Key finding conclude restaurants are largely seen as approachable, but do not perform as well on empowerment, defined as making the consumer feel confident or self-assured. Food and beverage companies performed the best on instilling a sense of pride, but not as well on curiosity and empowerment compared to other industries.