Brand. What is it good for?

Future looked nice in 1993. I know, "the Internet" was not a household name, SMS had just been launched as a side feature, but the good news were that brands were soon to disappear.
How come? Because we would live in a brave new world of commodities, where the power would be on the hands of big distributors, which would sell "white products" (without any brands), their taste and feel were basically the same, at very low prices.
Well, that idea did not stuck. People were just not used to all-too-descriptive, no pictures packages. Maybe the images of XIX century pre-branding economy were too harsh...
Hence big distribution started to sell products with their own brands. In fact, with labels emulating the category market leader.
So now it would be the same stuff, only cheaper. Oh goody goody!
Let's face it, people would understand that the discount corresponded to the producers' profit margin, which the consumer no longer needed to pay.

Why then in the future (i.e., righ now) we still see brands, or better, why are the brands so strong and alive? Basically because the economic powerhouses refused to yeld that power to distributors. At least not all.
So they had to reorganise their cost structure (do I hear relocation and outsourcing?), and used the savings (just guess) in advertising their brands! Thus the brands became values in themselves, and not because the product would be so much better physically.

To the point that nowadays you should indeed price yourself up, because people still think that more expensive means better quality.
One Finnish example, because it's so obvious it hurts: the coffee market is dominated by a brand which has its products marked-up relatively to competitors. At the same time, blind taste after blind taste gives the 50% market shareholder the worse results. Yes, it is that unbearable!
At the same time, they flood the market with ads, finishing with the ironic "Naturally [brand name]".
Yet people do not realise that coffee tastes BAD if they look at the package (or even if they do, one said "I just put more milk on it"), on the contrary, they say "this really must be better, because it's more expensive". NO, they must keep that price high to pay for all the advertising, you tasteless morons!

So I don't believe in brands? Oh yes I do, but only if I see any aditional benefit on it. There is a soft drink in Portugal called "Sumol". I am a total addict, because not only it tastes GREAT, it has almost 10% of fruit juice. Yes, that much. So much that the world leader has to put 8% of juice in Portugal, while in Finland it puts only 4%. And guess what, the Finnish leader (a local brand) puts only 2%. Read your labels, people!
Thus I don't mind paying that premium; after all, fruit juice costs more than water. So I'm not paying a "pure brand premium", but instead a "objective quality premium".

My point is: brands are good, only if there is substance to support them.