Why Abercrombie & Fitch Is America’s Most Hated Retail Brand

Abercrombie & Fitch and Wal-Mart are making headlines for being America’s most hated retail brands according to a recent customer satisfaction survey.

The American Customer Satisfaction Index ranks the country’s biggest retailers by polling 9,358 customers about their recent shopping experiences. Abercrombie & Fitch received an overall score of scored 65, about 10 points behind the retail average. And Wal-Mart ranked a predictable second most unpopular retailer, with a score of 66.

The key question is: Could both these brands have avoided ranking so poorly?

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For Abercrombie & Fitch, the answer is a resounding, yes. The specialty clothing brand has been struggling to repair its reputation after a public relations disaster in May 2013 that was handled poorly by then-CEO Mike Jeffries.

At the time, Jeffries came under fire for statements he made seven years prior indicating that his company was only interested in selling to cool, popular and thin people. He then boasted about being “exclusionary.”

When Jeffries’ statements went viral and the public lashed out calling him insensitive, he remained silent for far too long. Long enough for celebrities Ellen DeGeneres and Kirstie Alley to rally against him and for several other public protests to make headlines.

Almost two weeks after the initial outpour, Jeffries issued one of those lame non-apology apologies:

“While I believe this 7 year old, resurrected quote has been taken out of context, I sincerely regret that my choice of words was interpreted in a manner that has caused offense,” he said, in a statement. “A&F is an aspirational brand that, like most specialty apparel brands, targets its marketing at a particular segment of customers. However, we care about the broader communities in which we operate and are strongly committed to diversity and inclusion.”

Jeffries insincere apology, which implied he was woefully misunderstood, was the worst move he could have made. Why bother saying sorry if you’re just going to enrage customers more? Not to mention, his words came far too late.

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The man who headed Abercrombie & Fitch for over two decades never fully recovered from his reputation nightmare, and in December 2014, Jeffries left the company after 11 straight quarters of negative store sales.

All of this goes to show how one mishandled incident can cause irreparable damage to a company. A couple years later, and Abercrombie & Fitch scores the lowest in the American Customer Satisfaction Index.

As for Wal-Mart, a company that has consistently performed low in the annual index, their reputation problems are decades old and likely much harder to avoid.

The multinational giant is still trying to repair its image after it was revealed in the mid 90s that the retailer used sweatshops to manufacture clothing. More recently, Wal-Mart has battled image destroying news reports about low-wage American workers and selling parmesan cheese made of wood chips.

Yet for a company like Wal-Mart to offer such ridiculously low prices, it will always engage in questionably unethical practices which unfettered capitalism demands. Maintaining a squeaky clean image is a much more daunting task. No amount of PR mastery will hide the reality of sweatshops from the American public.