The Shout Magazine (New Zealand)

World’s most valuable drinks brands revealed

By Andy Young/www.theshout.com.au

Leading independent branded business valuation and strategy consultancy, Brand Finance, has revealed its 500 most valuable brands in the world for 2017, and this year sees just five alcoholic brands listed.

The list is compiled using what Brand Finance calls its ‘Royalty Relief approach’, which involves estimating the likely future sales that are attributable to a brand and calculating a royalty rate that would be charged for the use of that brand. The overall brand value also includes a brand strength index and estimated brand revenues.

Globally Brand Finance put Google as the world’s most valuable brand, up from second place last year. That move saw Apple slip from top spot in 2016 to second, while Amazon.com kept the same third spot on the list that it had last year.

The most valuable global drinks brand was listed as Moutai (a distilled Chinese liquor) once again. The growing value and importance of the Chinese alcohol market saw Moutai increase its position from 184 on the Global 500 list, to 118.

Despite the apparent drop in the popularity of mainstream beer, the next three most valuable drinks brands show that there is still huge value attributable to big beer brands.

Bud Light is the second most valuable drinks brand, up from 291 last year to 232 this year, third is Budweiser up to 278 from 328 and fourth is Heineken, up from 350 to 317 on the overall Global 500 list.

The top five most valuable drinks brands list is rounded out by Johnnie Walker, which was the only one of the top five drinks brands to drop down, going from 317 in 2016 to 374 this year.