Image - Rui Vieira - PA Wire
They were once the giants of the corporate world, with billions of pounds on their balance sheets and hundreds of thousands of employees on their books.
However, the glory days of some of the world's biggest companies were not to last.
Whether through the toxic bite of the recession, the stench of scandal or just plain old bad management the likes of WorldCom, Enron and Lehman Brothers have all seen their reputations trashed and their businesses reduced to rubble at the start of the 21st century, while high-street staples have crumbled under the weight of the downturn.
Why they fell
As far as highly dubious business practices goes, even Bernard Madoff could have learnt a thing or two from Enron. The Texan energy company enjoyed a meteoric rise to become the seventh-largest company in the US with 21,000 staff in 40 countries.
However, the secrets of its success were less about hard graft and schmoozing with the right people and more about cooking the books. Top executives excelled themselves in exploiting accounting loopholes, hiding billions of dollars worth of debt and artificially inflating profits by around $600 million.
As the deception unraveled, investors deserted the sinking ship and Enron applied for bankruptcy in December 2001. Directors Jeffrey Skilling and Kenneth Lay found themselves facing one of the biggest fraud and conspiracy trials ever to rock the corporate world - and were shocked to be found guilty of multiple charges relating to the company's collapse.
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Dot gone
With the shockwaves from the Enron scandal still reverberating around the business community, suspicious glances were soon being cast in WorldCom's direction.
The telecoms firm grew to be the second largest long-distance phone company in the US at the turn of the century by buying 60 other companies in just 15 years. At its height WorldCom was valued at $180 billion, employing 80,000 people.
On the surface it seemed that business was booming although the rise of mobile phones, lower-than-expected demand from consumers and increased competition started to take their toll.
Financial executives started manipulating the figures between 2000 and 2002 and while some observant shareholders sniffed a rat, their June 2001 lawsuit was thrown out.
It was only a year later that American regulator the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed civil fraud charges against WorldCom and the group admitted inflating its profits by $3.8 billion.
After the group filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, it lived to fight another day and in 2003 changed its name to MCI.
Scandal closer to home
The turn of the millennium scandals were not just tearing through corporate America. In the UK, the storm clouds were soon gathering over manufacturing darling Marconi as it moved away from the defence sector and ploughed its money into new technology investments.
As the hi-tech bubble burst and the worldwide demand for telecoms equipment evaporated, bosses Lord Simpson and John Mayo kept sending out positive signals to investors - despite soaring debt and plunging profits. When the truth finally came to light in 2001, Marconi's shares went into freefall and its senior executives fled leaving furious shareholders high and dry.
Is your money safe anywhere?
It's not just traders piling their money into the stock market who have ended up badly burnt, regular savers also found out the hard way that there's no such thing as a safe option in the business world.
The collapse of Farepak, one of the largest Christmas hamper and saving clubs, left hundreds of thousands of families facing a bleak festive period in 2006.
Problems started when parent company, European Home Retail, borrowed cash to fund its £35 million takeover of a book sales firm, DMG, in 2000. However, the business took a turn for the worse DMG was sold on for just £5 million.
In 2006 it then hit cashflow troubles when its suppliers demanded upfront payments and by August EHR was suspended from the London Stock Exchange.
Lender HBOS refused to lend to £1.5 million and the company went into administration. More than 300,000 families lost their savings while the bosses who oversaw the disastrous DMG deal received golden handshakes upon their departure.
Financial meltdown
Banks, in contrast, used to be seen as a good bet; solid, dependable and a rich source of income for investors. How they actually made their money was one of those things nobody paid much attention to - before the credit crisis struck, that is.
In hindsight, taking high risk home loans from the US and repackaging them into complex bundles of debt before selling them randomly across the world was not the best idea to ever come out of the financial sector.
For many of the banking powerhouses, those risky assets proved to be disastrous when overstretched homeowners fell behind with their mortgage payments. In the case of the investment banks of Wall Street, it was nothing short of catastrophic.
Back in March 2008, Bear Stearns became the first high-profile casualty of the credit crisis after taking on too much subprime debt.
When other banks refused to lend to it and panic-stricken investors rushed to pull out their cash, it cleared the way for JP Morgan Chase to snap up the beleaguered bank for $1.4 billion - a shadow of its previous $18 billion price tag.
Old names vanish
In September, Lehman Brothers realised the error of its ways after notching up multi-billion dollar losses through a series of badly judged bets on mortgage securities. As potential buyers pulled the plug on a rescue takeover deal and the US government refused to step in, the 158-year-old company was forced to file for bankruptcy.
US lender Washington Mutual claimed the crown of the biggest bank failure in US history after regulators swooped in to shut the bank amid fears its cash flow could run dry.
Banks in the UK were also brought to their knees. The government was forced to step in and nationalise Northern Rock after the credit markets froze over and people queued round the block to take out their cash.
HBOS, which had heavy exposure to bad mortgage debts, was shoved into a hastily arranged marriage with Lloyds which in turn needed a £17 billion financial lifeline to stay afloat. Royal Bank of Scotland received a £20 billion lifeline in return for a 70% stake as panic swept the markets.
A year later the government was forced to put more money into the bailed-out banks and promised to break up and sell on their expensively acquired assets.
MSN Money's full coverage of the banking break-up
Retailers see red
Elsewhere in the business community, the worst recession since the Great Depression has also wreaked havoc.
One of the original stalwarts of the high street, Woolworths' much lamented demise came a fraction short of its 100th birthday.
Its pick-and-mix selection of household goods and entertainment merchandise had served it well until the advent of online shopping and the aggressive expansion plans of the supermarket severely eroded its customer base.
With a £295 million debt mountain, a £100 million pension deficit and cash-flow woes, Woolies was forced to close its 807 stores before the brand emerged from the ashes in January as an online-only business.
Flatpack furniture pioneer MFI also found itself on a downhill slope as struggled to modernise its dated brand image and overcome jokes that its kitchen and bedroom furniture were "Made-for-idiots". With the rise of Swedish competitor Ikea providing stiff competition, its 111 stores closed in December after the business failed to find a buyer.
Meanwhile, cut-price furniture chain Land of Leather opened its doors for business for just 12 years before going into administration in January after three profit warnings in 2008. It blamed its downfall on consumer cutting back on bigger ticket purchases.
The list of smaller longstanding companies no longer in business stretches on infinitely - and with the recession still rumbling on there will undoubtedly be more companies of all shapes and sizes consigned to the dustbin of corporate history.
It's kind of upsetting, it was the only bloody game shop in my home town, and it gets replaced by yet another food store to add to the 90% of shops in the town!!