Evolve or Die? 24/7 Wall St’s predictions: Ten Brands That Will Disappear In 2012

Laura Dodgson, London

Is any brand safe in today’s volatile market? Since 2008 we have seen many high street brands vanish into obscurity, so it was with great interest that JCPR recently read 24-7 Wall St.’s article on the ‘Ten Brands that will disappear in 2012′.

Their predictions have proved ominously prescient in the past foreseeing that brands such as Blockbuster and T-Mobile would buckle under economic pressures and this year’s predictions seem no less likely with stock market losers Nokia, socially in-ept MySpace and decidely un-hip American Apparel all featuring in the list.

The site takes a methodical approach in deciding which brand is likely to do the walk of shame in the next 18 months, with the major criteria being:

1. A rapid fall in sales and deep losses

2. Disclosures by the parent of the brand that it might go out of business

3. Rapidly rising costs that are extremely unlikely to be recouped through higher prices

4. Companies which are sold

5. Companies that go into bankruptcy

6. Firms that have lost the great majority of their customers

7. Operations with rapidly withering market share

Each of the ten brands on the list suffers from one or more of these problems. Each one of the ten will be gone, based on their definitions, within 18 months.

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