Bricking it: Lego's top of the charts - Photograph: Oliver Lang, AP/Getty Images
A bit off topic this, but stick with me. The most reputable company in the world, according to a survey conducted by the Reputation Institute is Danish toy manufacturer Lego. Ikea came second, followed by Italian food company Barilla.
The system works by giving a rating between 0 and 100, based on 60,000 interviews asking ordinary people to score companies on "trust, esteem, admiration and good feeling". Given that way of ranking, it's not hard to imagine why Lego - a clean brand full of happy memories - scores so highly.
But where are the technology companies? Well, the highest placed electronics name is Canon, at No 16. Other notables in the top 50 include Matsushita (21st), Philips (27th), Bosch (42nd) and Nokia (44th). If you count companies primarily known for vehicle engineering, then you could also add Toyota at No 6, Honda at 20 and BMW at 34. Considering the size of the industries involved I don't think that's a brilliant showing.
The British case, however, is even more concerning: there are six UK-based names in the top 200, led by Marks & Spencer at 23. The others are Tesco, Boots, Unilever, Sainsburys and Morrison's - and apart from Unilever, which makes food and homecare products, these are all basically straight retail. That's got to be a disappointing show, even if some of Britain's biggest businesses are not universally loved - BT, Vodafone - or plain controversial - Shell, BP, GlaxoSmithKline, British American Tobacco. The best we can offer is a handful of retailers - perhaps meaning that Napoleon was right when he cribbed Adam Smith and called Britain "a nation of shopkeepers".
This chimes, in a way, with the recent plea from Sir Harold Kroto about the increasing poverty of science education in the UK. If Britain's reputation is built through companies like M&S and Tesco, rather than building on our skills in science and engineering, then the service-oriented culture will just continue to get gain mass and dominate our national cultures.
