Apple’s future is not so gloomy

So Marks & Spencer and Apple are among the least likely brands to survive to 2015 (MW November 8). What nonsense.

What consistently comes up in any research on the power of brands is their longevity. Why is it that nearly all the top consumer brands are long established and why do 90 per cent of all start-ups fail? Because more than anything consumers like to trust who they are buying from.

The lessons of the Internet alone should tell us that established brands are the most likely to survive. M&S will be here in 2015 and in 2050, as will John Lewis, WH Smith, Boots and Woolworths; and IBM, Microsoft and Apple for that matter. The brands that are least likely to survive are the ones that have been created in the past five years and are based principally on a price/value proposition.