If you look at Apple as if you were to acquire them (in some alternate universe where you had that financial capability), then yes I'd agree with you that their

If you look at Apple as if you were to acquire them (in some alternate universe where you had that financial capability), then yes I'd agree with you that their brand is their single biggest asset. However, I agree with the parent - you actually have to have great products and services that delight to become big and relevant... and stay big and relevant. This enables your sexy branding to be effective. Your sexy branding doesn't make your products and services better. It just lures consumers in, but that only works for so long unless you deliver on your promise. A brand is a promise kept as the old saying goes. This is from 7 years ago but a pretty good: The Twilight of Brands - https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/02/17/twilight-brands https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/02/17/twilight-brand... "the rise of brands was a response to an information-poor environment. When consumers had to rely on advertisements and their past experience with a company, brands served as proxies for quality; if a car was made by G.M., or a ketchup by Heinz, you assumed that it was pretty good. It was hard to figure out if a new product from an unfamiliar company was reliable or not, so brand loyalty was a way of reducing risk. As recently as the nineteen-eighties, nearly four-fifths of American car buyers stayed loyal to a brand." "Roku, a maker of streaming entertainment devices, has thrived even though its products have to compete with similar ones made by Apple (which is usually cited as the world’s most valuable brand)." So let's say you buy Apple (just the name and branding and nothing else) - you still aren't going to be shit without everything else. We aren't in an information poor environment. Consumers would know the brand was sold and that the quality could not be trusted.