24/7 Wall St. has created a new list of brands that will disappear, which includes Sears, Sony Pictures, American Apparel, Nokia, Saab, A&W All-American Foods Restaurants, Soap Opera Digest, Sony Ericsson, MySpace, and Kellogg’s Corn Pops.
Each year, 24/7 Wall St. regularly compiles a list of brands that are going to disappear within the next year.
Last year’s list proved to be accurate in many instances, predicting the demise of T-Mobile among others.
In late May, it was announced that AT&T would buy T-Mobile USA for $39 billion.
Other 2010 nominees — including Blockbuster — bit the dust, while companies such as Dollar Thrifty are on the road to oblivion.
Last September, after finally giving in to competition from Netflix and buckling under nearly $1 billion in debt, Blockbuster filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. And Dollar Thrifty car rental chain is still entertaining buyout offers from Avis and Hertz.
This year’s list of The Ten Brands That Will Disappear was assembled based on the following criteria: (1) a rapid fall-off in sales and steep 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; or (7) operations with rapidly withering market share.
Each of the ten brands on the list suffer from one or more of these problems, and are predicted to be gone within 18 months.
