Tesla has ranked dead last in Germany in a major European brand reputation survey, marking the steepest single-year collapse ever recorded by the study and placing the electric carmaker behind companies long associated with controversy and poor public perception.
The findings come from the “Reputation & Trust 2025” study conducted by Reputation and Trust Analytics, which evaluates major brands across eight dimensions including governance, leadership, responsibility, workplace conditions, innovation, and products and services.
In Germany, Europe’s largest car market, Tesla ranked 30th out of 30 companies surveyed, scoring 2.48 on a 1 to 5 scale. Any score below 2.5 is classified as “very bad.” Just one year earlier, Tesla held a mid-table score of 3.25. The year-over-year drop of 0.77 points is the largest reputational decline the study has seen since it began in 2013.
To put the result in perspective, Tesla ranked below brands already known for reputational challenges. Chinese shopping platform Temu scored 2.76, Deutsche Bahn 2.68, and even Nestlé, a company frequently criticized for issues ranging from environmental damage to labor practices, scored higher at 2.56.
Large reputation swings are rare in the survey. Even Meta, after a difficult year marked by criticism of social media and AI, dropped only 0.28 points and still scored 2.95. Tesla’s decline was nearly three times larger.
Across the eight categories measured, Tesla performed relatively well in innovation, financial performance, and products and services. Its weakest areas were governance, working conditions, and corporate responsibility, the very factors most closely tied to leadership behavior and public trust.
The poor German result is not an isolated case. Tesla also ranked near the bottom across the Nordic countries. It placed third-from-last in Sweden and Denmark, fourth-from-last in Finland, and fifth-from-last in Norway and Estonia. In Sweden alone, Tesla’s reputation score has fallen from 3.88 in 2021 to 2.43 in 2025, a dramatic multi-year decline.
Analysts point to labor disputes and leadership conduct as key drivers. Tesla has been locked in a prolonged conflict with unions in Sweden, an issue that resonates strongly across Nordic countries with deep-rooted pro-union cultures. Similar tensions are now emerging in Germany.
Much of the reputational damage appears tied to Tesla’s CEO, Elon Musk. His increasingly visible political activity, including support for extremist figures and repeated controversies in Europe, has alienated large portions of Tesla’s traditional customer base. In Germany in particular, Musk’s actions in early 2025, including widely criticized public gestures on live television, triggered protests and intense backlash.
Riku Ruokolahti, Development Director at Reputation and Trust Analytics, summarized the shift bluntly. Tesla once allowed drivers to signal environmental responsibility by choosing an electric car. When Musk’s behavior began to contradict those values, the entire brand image collapsed. According to Ruokolahti, it is a textbook example of how a reputation built on a single pillar can unravel quickly.
The reputational collapse mirrors Tesla’s declining European sales and follows other negative indicators in Germany, including surveys showing overwhelming consumer reluctance to buy a Tesla and major job cuts at the Berlin gigafactory.
Once seen as a symbol of sustainability and technological progress, Tesla now finds itself associated with governance failures and leadership controversies. In Germany, that shift has been severe enough to push the company to the very bottom of the reputation rankings, behind brands that were already struggling to earn public trust.