I always find it strange when I see a company that manufactures one kind of product and then another kind of product that has nothing to do with the first one. LG makes cell phones and washing machines, Daewoo makes cars and VCR’s.
Any other strange companies like this out there?
In my former life as an accountant, our firm was the accountant for a company that had two product lines:
Doll’s eyes. Yes, those doll’s eyes.
Coffee scoops. Like those which used to come in the cans of Chock Full O’Nuts coffee.
I was not invoved with the client at all, so I don’t know how they managed to get into those particular product lines, or if they’re actually still in existence, but it always struck me as one of the weirdest company profiles out there. Like really out there 
Doll’s eyes and coffee scoops. Lots of story behind all of that. I’m entering the accounting field now. Instead of paying for the knowledge, I’d like to work for it for a bit. It seems like a good thing to know. Thanks for the good reply.
This weekend I saw commercials for a Bayer product. The Bayer that is famous for their asprin. The commercials were for plant fertilizer or some such garden aid. Whoda thunk?
I hope they are not mixing the two .
=)
General Electric has to be up there in the wide range category - light bulbs, appliances, medical imaging, locomotives, nuclear reactors and consumer finance.
Hitachi produces consumer electronics and mainframe computers.
Tyco puts out medical products, fire extinguishers and security systems. Sadly, they seem to be out of the toy train business.
Nearly all Japanese companies are going to have widely scattered product lines. Japanese industry developed as a (small) number of consortiums that effectively control all production. Basically, if someone came up with a new idea for a product, instead of founding a new company to build and market it, they would sell the rights to one of the large firms. There are actually fewer firms than it appears to the typical American consumer because a number of “competing” Japanese firms are simply different divisions of the larger firms.
(Since the bust of the 1990s, some of this may have begun changing in Japan, but I do not know to what level.)
Bayer is not that strange. It started out as a synthetic dye company, built itself a lab to test new products where it branched into pharmaceuticals. With WWI, its chemical capacity (both research and manufacturing) were used to support the munitions industry, further broadening the company’s scope. Once it had begun playing with more than one kind of chemical, it began looking on any chemical process as within its marketing scope.
At the end of WWII, the company was threatened with dissolution or dismemberment, but it survived and began acquiring other companies in related fields so that now anything that can be remotely identified with “chemicals” is liable to have some Bayer subsidiary producing products for that market.
Both are fairly simple chemicals and Bayer is a chemical company. I’m not understanding what’s so odd about this.
My nomination is Yamaha, who produce (amongst much else) pianos, guitars, … and motor-bikes.
We 'Merkins know Samsung for their cellphones and TVs. But they also make the light rail trolley cars used in San Diego and (I think) Calgary…(I hear one of them pulling in right now, in fact!)… And in Israel they’ve got a good share of the bathroom hand-dryer market.
Mitsubishi is famous for their cars, but also make/made TVs and had an exclusive chip deal with Apple for a while.
Nash made cars and refridgerators. Crosley made cars and electronics, IIRC. And GM’s been into refridgerators, cars, home finance, and other things.
Mitsubishi also made a rather famous airplane in WWII, did they not?
The Zero?
Soltam, an Israeli ironworking company, makes excellent cooking pots and pans… and also advanced military mortars and tube artillery. If you think about it, the difference between a pot and a mortar is mainly one of proportions.
There was an American company I had reason to contact some years ago that made medical devices and car parts.
Robin
My favorite was a change over time. The Eureka Music Box company decided it needed to become more diverse and started selling vacuum cleaners. They discontinued the music box line decades ago, but their vacuum cleaner line is still doing fine.
IBM (International Business Machine) originally sold clocks exclusively.
I also specify a lot of Tyco splice enclosures for fiber optic networks.
Not a manufacturing company, but back in Greenfield, WI, there used to be a store that had a big sign out front advertising Guns and Glass. I always thought that was an odd combination. I wonder if it’s still there.
According to wikipedia Both Calgary and SD light transits use the Siemens-Duewag U2, made in Dusseldorf. As a frequent rider of the Calgary transit system I can verify this in Calgary, but while I have visited SD I have never ridden on the trains there.
I’m not really sure if the Japanese or Korean conglomerates count as “one company”.
I take the San Diego trolley every day. There are two kinds–a new one on the line I take, and the one that’s been in use for a while–and one of them is indeed the Siemens-Duewag U2. I saw the Wiki article and lookd for the name, and saw it on a placard type thing in the trolley car.
Near where I live, there used to be a store that sold mirrors and fireworks, which I always thought was an odd combo.