When Donald Trump was elected President, there were worries that he would use the White House for profit by endorsing products he had a personal stake in. But a new poll shows that the POTUS’ endorsement may be having the opposite effect – it is damaging the Trump brand.
On NBC News’ “Meet the Press,” host Chuck Todd discussed a poll from Simmons Research that revealed that only 18 percent of people surveyed said they would be “more likely to use” a product endorsed by the president, while 49 percent were “less likely to use” such a product and 29 percent would “actively boycott.”
Even among those who identified as Republican, the numbers don’t look good. Only 31 percent of those who selected the “more likely” option identified as Republican, compared to 23 percent who said “less likely.”
The survey also asked Americans if they would buy from a company whose CEO openly supports Trump and whether a CEO’s support would lead them to pay more at a competing company. 34 percent said they would prefer not to buy at a pro-Trump CEO’s company, while 30 percent said they’d be willing to pay more at a competitor.
“We know Trump is a very polarizing figure, but these data suggest that the people who don’t like Trump feel much more strongly about it than the people who do like him,” Steven Millman, chief scientist at Simmons, told NBC News. “A strong association between Trump and a brand is likely to be damaging to the brand, unless its consumers are strong conservative.”
Check out the full results from NBC News here.