Toyota Still A Top 10 Brand, For Now

Brand Finance is a brand valuation consultancy that every year attempts to do the impossible -- to make something intangible (in this case, brand value) into tangible, and rank-able, list form.

So without further ado, here are the top ten most valuable brands in the world, from the perspective of the oracles at Brand Finance.

1. (1) Wal-Mart (41.365)

2. (5) Google (36.191)

3. (2) Coca-Cola (34.844)

4. (3) IBM (33.706)

5. (4) Microsoft (33.604)

6. (6) General Electric (31.909)

7. (8) Vodafone (28.995)

8. (7) HSBC (28.472)

9. (9) Hewlett-Packard (27.383)

10. (10) Toyota (27.319)

Time will tell whether Toyota takes a hit on next year's list but it’s hard to imagine that they'll still be top 10 in 2011.

What was even more interesting was surfing back through the 50 Golden Brands back catalogue. For example, in 1960 the top brand was Lego; in 1967 it was Heinz; and 1989 was Nike's year to top the list. The parade of iconic logos come and gone is just as striking.