did anyone see yahoo's front page right now on the top 10 businesses 2 disappear

United States
July 10, 2010 7:16pm CST
so I was reading on yahoo front page and they had this article on the 10 businesses they think will no longer exist. I hate to say it but I think they are wrong about block buster. I know they have been hit with other things that are on the market, but there will always be people that would rather pay cash up front for movies and rent than to go buy movies and the mess stack up in there home. also I was reading that T-mobile would belly up but that doesn't make since to me. They offer good products. Just something I wouldn't use because I need more in a phone. That's why I went to sprint. For someone who wants the option of not having to get a contract and do a go phone type deal they are good. so what do you think? is 24/7 wall street right on this? article: 10 Brands That May Disappear in 2011 by Douglas A. McIntyre Thursday, July 8, 2010 24/7 Wall St. has created a new list of brands that may disappear, which includes Readers Digest, Kia Motors, Dollar Thrifty (NYSE: DTG - News), Zale (NYSE: ZLC - News), Blockbuster (BLOKA.PK - News), T-Mobile, BP Plc (NYSE: BP - News), RadioShack (NYSE: RSH - News), Merrill Lynch and Moody's (NYSE: MCO - News). 24/7 Wall St. regularly compiles a report of brands that are likely to disappear in the near-term. Last April, and again in December, we published our findings. Usually, it would take a full year before such a list could be compiled again. However, the current economic climate has accelerated this process and a majority of the brands on the first two lists are either gone, have been acquired, or have filed for bankruptcy. With a number of the brands on the December list either gone or on a short-term path to extinction, 24/7 Wall St. has put together the latest version of the Ten Brands That Will Disappear. To qualify, we expect that brand to be gone by the end of 2011, or for its parent to be sold or go into Chapter 11. More from 24/7 Wall St.: Reader's Digest was once the most widely read magazine in the world. According to the company, it still may be when its overseas editions are taken into account. Last August, the company took its U.S. operations into Chapter 11 to decrease debt. It emerged from bankruptcy in February with $525 million in exit financing. The company cut the number of issues it publishes a year from 12 to 10 last year. It also cut its circulation guarantee for advertisers to 5.5 million copies from 8 million. It would have been unthinkable just a few years ago that a magazine as old and famous as Reader's Digest would be shuttered. However, Reader's Digest as it is known in the U.S. will be gone. Blockbuster was the national leader in the video rental business for nearly two decades. Now it is contemplating Chapter 11 to eliminate debt. The company lost $65 million last quarter. Its revenue continues to fall rapidly as firms such as Redbox and NetFlix (Nasdaq: NFLX - News) siphon off its revenue. Blockbuster has more than 6,000 stores, so it is hard to imagine that the company could disappear. But, there is some precedent, even if it is on a smaller scale. Blockbuster rival Movie Gallery said in February that it would close all of its 2,400 U.S. stores. Blockbuster's model of renting movies through physical locations has been destroyed by cable and satellite video on demand, DVDs via mail and dispensing machines. Blockbuster may still be around as a company that has movie kiosks and a small mail and Internet-delivered content business. But its brick and-mortar business is dead. Dollar Thrifty Automotive Group, the car rental company, is for sale. Hertz (NYSE: HTZ - News) is a potential buyer, as is Avis Budget (NYSE: CAR - News). Each of the larger car rental firms would use the Dollar Thrifty business to expand their market share. That does not mean that they would keep the brand. The current company is not much of a business. It made only $27 million last quarter on revenue of $348 million. It has more than $1.5 billion in "debt and other obligations." The number of vehicles that Dollar Thrifty operates at any one time is only 95,000 compared to 420,000 for Hertz. The firm's customer base and some of its locations may be valuable, but Dollar Thrifty can't compete with Avis and Hertz. A decade ago, the car rental industry was able to support six independent brands. A significant drop in business and leisure travel and sharp competition among the companies has already caused the creation of Avis Budget. Dollar Thrifty will be the next casualty of the industry's consolidation. T-Mobile, the U.S. wireless provider, is owned by telecom giant Deutsche Telekom (DTEGY.PK - News). It is the No.4 cellular company in an American market that only supports two really successful firms -- AT&T Wireless and Verizon Wireless. Even the third-largest company in the market -- Sprint-Nextel (NYSE: S - News) -- has 50 million customers. T-Mobile had 34 million customers at the end of last year. T-Mobile only had a profit of $306 million in 2009. That was down from $483 million in 2008. T-Mobile not only faces three larger competitors, it also has to begin to offer 4G service to compete with Sprint's new WiMax service and LTE-based products from AT&T (NYSE: T - News) and Verizon (NYSE: VZ - News). T-Mobile may seek a partner to offer a 4G network, but there are no super-fast broadband networks likely to be finished before its three rivals offer the service. As it now stands, T-Mobile has no future in the U.S. A merger with Sprint-Nextel has been mentioned several times. The combined company would have a customer base about the same size as AT&T or Verizon. And the transaction would probably make Deutsche Telekom a large owner of the combined operation. Another alternative would be a merger with Virgin Mobile. Maybe Deutsche Telekom will just change the firm's name. Moody's Corp. may have the name with the largest negative brand equity in the U.S. Scandals about the company's rating of mortgage-backed securities and allegations that the firm compromised it ratings process to get business have ruined the company's image. Moody's is more than 100 years old, but the reputation it built over those years is irretrievably lost. There is a chance Moody's could be ruined by civil actions, four of which are pending, and by charges brought by the U.S. government. Overseas authorities may bring a number of actions against the company as well. Moody's activities are almost certainly to be more regulated, which will squeeze margins and hurt sales. Moody's may end up selling its accounts to a new rating company, which would probably hire many of its employees. Pacific Investment Management Co. and other institutional investors have talked about taking on some if not all the roles that the current rating firms play. Research houses like Alliance Bernstein (NYSE: AB - News) could also take on some of those rolls. Part of Moody's operation may stay alive, but there is not much left to salvage in the brand. BP: The case against the BP brand is not so much that the company will enter bankruptcy. It is that BP may end up breaking into pieces for its own sake. This may be to put the liabilities for the Deepwater Horizon spill into a company that also holds escrow capital to cover the huge costs of clean-up and suits. BP may also want to separate its successful refining operations from its exploration business, or recreate an American- based company similar to BP America, which existed for two decades. A restructuring of BP would also allow the firm to take a badly crippled brand and give the oil operation a new name -- much as it did when it changed its name from British Petroleum. The second time may be the charm. RadioShack is one of the oldest retailers in the U.S. It was founded in 1921 and in the early 1960s was purchased by Tandy Corp. The Tandy name was used for some of Radio Shack's retail stores. RadioShack is currently a takeover target. There have been rumors that the company may be taken private via a leveraged buyout or purchased by Best Buy (NYSE: BBY - News), probably for its locations. Best Buy would certainly not keep the RadioShack brand because it is considered downscale and does not have the reputation for quality products and service that Best Buy enjoys. RadioShack has already begun to rebrand itself as "The Shack," an indication that it knows the older brand is a burden. Zale Corp. was founded in 1924 by the Zale brothers. It was one of the earliest retailers to offer the ability to buy items on credit. By 1980, Zale had revenue of over $1 billion. In 1992, Zale filed for bankruptcy and by the end of that decade, its revenue was $1.3 billion -- about the same as it is today. Zale has been at death's door for some time. Its market value is down to $48 million. The company is trying to turn itself around, but most experts are not convinced. The company recently made the Forbes list for firms with extreme financial risk. In the last quarter, the retailer lost $12 million on revenue of $360 million. Zale is also in a very crowded market that includes retailers as large as Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT - News). Golden Gate Capital recently put money into Zale to buy it time. New money may defer the point at which Zale goes under, but it won't prevent it. Merrill Lynch may have been acquired, but that will not keep it safe. In fact, quite the opposite is true. Banks and other large financial services firms have a habit of buying large retail brokerage houses and then changing their names. Shearson is gone. So is EF Hutton and Prudential. In most cases the parent company wants to put their own names on the door. That is very likely to happen to Merrill Lynch, which was at one point the largest full-service broker in the U.S. Merrill is now owned by Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC - News), and the buyout spawned a number of scandals that kept Merrill's name in the paper for weeks and did a great deal to harm its
1 person likes this
3 responses
@_sketch_ (5742)
• United States
11 Jul 10
I did read the article and I think that they are right about Blockbuster. A lot of Blockbusters in my state have been going out of business. However, I think that Hollywood Video is doing worse. Tons of them have been going out. People are more into Redbox, Netflix and things like that. It has a lot to do with the economy. People can't afford to spend as much money on movies as they used to and the majority of people seem to prefer the convenience of online rentals. I'm not sure about T-mobile. I like them because they're cheaper than the others. I sure hope that Cricket goes out of business though. They are terrible. I doubt that BP will go out of business. I think that people will soon forget about the oil spill. Many people don't care about it at all.
@_sketch_ (5742)
• United States
11 Jul 10
I forgot one thing that I was going to say. Blockbuster now has express machines that are just like Redbox. I've never used one yet as I haven't seen any near me, but I heard that they only cost a dollar, just like the Redbox. I believe that this may save the company.
• United States
17 Jul 10
I think they may down size but I don't think that they will completely get rid of them. There are many different types of movies that have been made and I think that the business will still be around they may just not have but one store in each city. i've used the kiosk on both red box and block buster. red box does't work half the time I try to use it and the kiosk with blockbuster only has the newest releases.
@funorb12 (456)
• United States
11 Jul 10
Block buster should go out of business in my opinion. Netflix is making a lot more money renting movies than Blockbuster selling movies. Blockbuster also rents, but I don't like them. GO OUT OF BUSINESS
• United States
17 Jul 10
I understand your frustration but there are also a lot of people who don't pay with credit cards. they pay with cash. going in side and renting older movies with cash is an option for these people. My grandmother won't pay anything with out a check. she doesn't even do a credit card or bank card. that's just how she is. Classical movies, older movies and movies of actors that are done and gone are there. these other places only do new releases. it would be sweet if they had more than just the new releases and most popular watched n there. thanks for your response
• United States
22 Jul 10
Umm. Pretty sure that in order to even rent from Blockbuster, you need to have a credit/checking card on file. This is in case a movie is late or doesn't get returned; they can just charge it to your account. So Blockbusster is not about "cash up front"...If one has the card to even access raggedy Blockbuster, why wouldn't they use the same card to rent a movie for $1.06 from Redbox, as opposed to renting a movie from ridiculous Blockbuster for $3 and change? That sounds completely insane. As for older releases, Blockbuster does NOT have everything. And most people have access to a library, where they are stepping the DVD game up. And all that is for free!
• United States
11 Jul 10
I really dont think blockbuster should go out of business. Because its still good for renting video games. Without block buster I wont be able to rent video games and I dont like those services online lol. And they have a lot of movies you can buy for a pretty good price used so I hope they dont go out of business it would suck if they did.
• United States
17 Jul 10
Well you and so many others do. i think they may down size and that wouldn't surprise me at all. I mean lets face it. the dvd's come in the store just as soon as they do in the block buster place now. before the dvd rentals would be out before they were in retail stores and also the dvd's are cheaper and cheaper to find them once they hit retail as well. thanks for your response