Brands are still alive in the economic downturn
Even if the economic crysis affected their sales, the strongest brands in the world still remain the strongest. In the latest annual ranking of Interbrand's top ranking brands, Coca-Cola, IBM and Microsoft still keep their positions as last year. I still can't understand though what IBM and Oracle and SAP do in this list because they don't have products for retail market which means that people don't have a direct contact with them. Even if they make a lot of money i really don't think that they should have any place in the top 100.
Intebrand's top 100 ranking brands - link
Death of brands greatly exaggerated - link