Toyota, Buick, and Lexus earn top spot in auto dealer ratings

(March 27, 2014) WABAN, Mass. — Toyota, Buick, and Lexus dealers deliver the best customer experience in the auto industry, according to the 2014 Temkin Experience Ratings, an annual ranking of companies based on a study of 10,000 U.S. consumers.

The three companies all earned a 74% rating — only narrowly surpassing Subaru at 73%. While this is both Buick's and Lexus's first time evaluated in the Ratings, this is Toyota's second straight year in the top spot.

At the other end of the spectrum, Chrysler tumbled down the rankings from its "okay" rating in 2013 to a "poor" rating this year, finishing as the lowest-ranking auto dealer with a score of 50% and a ranking of 256th place. Kia and Dodge also declined in the ratings and received "poor" scores of 57% and 55% respectively, both hovering near the bottom of the auto industry rankings for the third year in a row.

"Toyota, Buick, and Lexus dealers are leading the industry-wide effort to become more customer-centric," states Bruce Temkin, managing partner of Temkin Group.

Here are some additional findings from the auto industry:

The ratings of all auto dealers in the 2014 Temkin Experience Ratings are as follows: Toyota (74%), Buick (74%), Lexus (74%), Subaru (73%), Hyundai (70%), Ford (68%), Honda (67%), Chevrolet (67%), Mercedes-Benz (67%), BMW (65%), Audi (64%), Cadillac (64%), Nissan (63%), Mazda (62%), Volkswagen (61%), GM (61%), Jeep (61%), Kia (57%), Dodge (55%), and Chrysler (50%).
   
Hyundai (+6 points), BMW (+5 points), Nissan (+4 points), and Toyota (+3 points) improved their ratings the most between 2013 and 2014.
   
Chrysler (-10 points), Dodge (-5 points), and Kia (-1 point) were the only auto dealers whose ratings declined between 2013 and 2014.
   
Overall, the auto industry averaged a 66% rating in the 2014 Temkin Experience Ratings and placed 9th out of 19 industries. It was also one of the 15 industries to improve its rating over the past year, increasing its average by 2.1 percentage points.

Now in its fourth year of publication, the 2014 Temkin Experience Ratings examines the quality of the customer experience delivered by 268 organizations across 19 industries: airlines, appliance makers, auto dealers, banks, car rental agencies, computer makers, credit card issuers, fast food chains, grocery chains, health plans, hotel chains, insurance carriers, Internet service providers, investment firms, parcel delivery services, retailers, software firms, TV service providers, and wireless carriers.

To generate these ratings, Temkin Group asked consumers to evaluate their experiences with a company across three dimensions: functional (can you do what you want to do?), accessible (how easy is it to work with the company?), and emotional (how do you feel about the interactions?). Temkin Group then averaged these three scores to produce a company's Temkin Experience Rating.

In these ratings, a score of 70% or above is considered "good," and a score of 80% or above is considered "excellent."