You may be surprised at some major brands that will all but disappear 2012. According to @247WallSt, who puts out a top list of vanishing brand each year, there are at least 10 major brands that will disappear in 2012. Among the list of brands to go are Sears, Sony Pictures, American Apparel, Nokia, Saab, A&W All-American Foods Restaurants, Soap Opera Digest, Sony Ericsson, MySpace, and Kellogg’s Corn Pops.
I think the brands that surprised me the most were Sears and Kellogg’s Corn Pops. I guess I would have to say I was semi-surprised at the mention of Sears because everytime I go in our local store it is vacant and you can hardly find anyone working there either. They failed to compete and stay current and they acquired KMart which brought their image even further down.
Kellogg’s Corn Pops surprised me the most. I love that cereal but the article said that consumers are buying healthier cereals and it had an 18% drop in sales last year, well under Frosted Flakes sales. Really? Frost Flakes? And that doesn’t have a boatload of sugar in it? I’m still trying to figure out how Americans are eating healthier when everyone is so overweight.
One thing I didn’t know about Corn Pops is this, “Corn Pops also contain mono- and diglycerides, used to bind saturated fat, and BHT for freshness, which is also used in embalming fluid.” Okay, there’s a good reason to get rid of Kellogg’s Corn Pops if not for the sugar.
Other brands like Sony Picture, Saab, Nokia were a little surprising but not that much and A&W I understand because a brand running a restaurant around a soda, and one that isn’t popular among the masses will eventually fail. Of course, it did have it’s heyday but things changes.
Soap Opera Digest and MySpace I totally get. MySpace was at the top when Facebook had their old format but once Facebook changed their format a few years ago and made it easier to share and interact with people MySpace was lost. They didn’t even fight back and that was the end of them. Soap Operas are taking a nose dive on TV these days and it is just logical that Soap Opera digest would follow. Who needs to watch a Soap Opera when we have reality TV and instant daily drama on Twitter and Facebook?
The next to go? Libraries because everything is online but wait, they aren’t a brand 🙂
I hope libraries don’t go away because I use mine a lot. I go online and place holds for books on CD by my favorite authors all the time. They send me an email when it arrives and I pick it up when they’re open. I can’t afford to buy books, and books on CD are almost like watching TV with a blown picture tube. I can listen at home or in my car. It also saves trees, because I am not accumulating hard cover books to to try to resell or throw away. If you think about it, a library book is the easiest form of recycling!