The Luxury Institute has just released its 2009 Luxury Brand Status Index (LBSI) survey, which identifies the top brands based on the ratings of wealthy consumers.

Which luxury home appliances brands deliver the best combination of quality, exclusivity, customer experience and peer prestige?  High net-worth consumers rated Wolf, Viking and Sub-Zero the "Best of the Best" among the 20 brands that were rated.

In the bath fixtures category, Hansgrohe, Showhouse by Moen and Franke  were rated the top three among 16 brands.

The LBSI asks high net-worth consumers to rate luxury brands by category across four equally weighted components: Consistently Superior Quality, Uniqueness and Exclusivity, Making the Customer Feel Special across the entire experience and Being Consumed by People Who Are Admired and Respected.

The "Best of the Best" are: (LBSI score out of 10)

  --  Home Appliances
        -  Wolf-7.86
        -  Viking-7.66
        -  Sub-Zero-7.64

  --  Bathroom Fixtures
        -  Hansgrohe-7.77
        -  Showhouse by Moen-7.35
        -  Franke-7.31

"As high net-worth consumers demand maximum value for the luxury they consume, our independent and objective ratings are the only source that is based solely on the voice of high net-worth consumers, using unbiased panels and independent analytical firms to run and tabulate the results. These top-rated brands deliver luxury, and consumers appreciate it," 

"Luxury requires a reinvention based on radical innovation of design, quality, craftsmanship and especially service, all delivered to a client who demands to know why he, or she, is paying a significant premium for commoditized goods and services. Luxury needs to reinvent the values that drive optimal customer experience to a new level of performance that high net-worth consumers will rate as true luxury. The reality is that, despite what pundits say, the success rules of luxury will soon be re-written by the radically creative luxury innovators, and the winners will be determined only by unbiased consumer ratings, not luxury pundits."

The proprietary Luxury Brand Status Index (LBSI) survey is the only unbiased measure of the prestige of leading brands among wealthy Americans. A national sample of 1,208 wealthy American consumers, with an average income of $345,000 and average net-worth of $3.2 million, was surveyed online. Survey results are weighted to match demographic and net-worth profiles of the same audience according to the latest Survey of Consumer Finances from The Federal Reserve.