The Walt Disney Company has the world’s most popular theme parks. They also make animated films.
The bookseller Amazon sells digital storage to, like, everyone.
This one is stunning to me. I never knew AMF was a cigarette company. They are so ubiquitous in bowling (I don’t bowl and even I knew that) you’d think that’s what they set out to do!
The company was founded by Rufus L Patterson, Jr - inventor of the automated cigarette making machine - in 1900. They initially made cigarette, baking and stitching machines. So I guess not a tobacco company, but a major supplier to tobacco companies.
Oh, that makes more sense. Automated machinery is their thing. But their range of automated machinery is pretty interesting! You need a thing to do a thing? We’ll make that thing!
I can’t believe that 43 posts on nobod has yet mentioned Peugeot:
The company’s logo, initially a lion walking on an arrow, symbolized the speed, strength, and flexibility of the Peugeot saw blades. The car and motorcycle company and the bicycle company parted ways in 1926, but the family-owned Cycles Peugeot continued to build bicycles throughout the 20th century until the brand name was sold off to unrelated firms. The family-owned firm Peugeot Saveurs continues to make and market grinders and other kitchen and table-service equipment.
A lot of these are one of two major categories huge conglomerates or companies that have manufacturing processes that are used for multiple productsthat are actually similar to manufacture but seem different from the outside.
For example, Sturm, Ruger, & Co. make guns and golf club heads. Why? They’re one of the leading precision metal casting outfits, and both gin parts and exotic metal golf club heads can be cast.
Or Kodak. Photographic film, precision coated stuff and pharmaceuticals. Turns out making film is a exercise in extremely precise material coating and chemical production.
Bic, for example makes little, cheap plastic items - lighters, pens and razors. Different functions but I’d bet they’re similar to manufacture.
Amazon is another good example - they’re a huge retailer, but as a result of building out the infrastructure and expertise to support that, they also sell web hosting and other sorts of online services.
And some of them branched as a result of similar manufacturing, but then went from there to similar purpose. For instance, Yamaha was in the motorcycle-and-piano business because pianos require a really strong steel frame to support the tension of all of those wires, and those are made using similar techniques to strong motorcycle frames. But electric pianos don’t need those strong frames, so electric pianos and motorcycles aren’t very similar in manufacture nor function, but Yamaha still makes both.
Bridgestone also used to make bicycles. Same with Panasonic. There is also a GMC-branded bicycle line (altho the bikes are actually manufactured by a real bike company).
Shimano is known for bicycle components, like shifters and derailleurs, but they also make fishing reels. It makes sense since both products involve intricate mechanisms.
Volkswagen makes cars, of course - but also currywurst sausages. And they have a WV Part number as well - 199 398 500 A.
Peugeot makes cars and also pepper mills.
I may be remembering wrong but weren’t they also involved in pet food? We have (had?) a Quaker Oats factory here in town for many years - back in the 70s it was Van Camps pork & beans but pretty sure in the 90s or 00s they were making dog food.
The Waterpik…an oral hygiene product which jetblasts your teeth with water and mouthwash…was sold by Teledyne…a defense contractor.
I don’t know about Quaker, but Purina pet foods branched off from the same company as Chex cereal.
Of course, pet food isn’t all that different from human food. It’s a little less demanding, and the labeling and marketing is different, but it’s still processing the same ingredients.
Yamaha got into the motorcycle business in the aftermath of WWII. At the time, the Japanese government wanted to increase their industrial output, but most of the factories in Japan had been bombed out during the war. Yamaha had one of the few factories left intact. So the government encouraged (polite way of saying “required”) Yamaha to make motorcycles too. AIUI, nowadays the two parts of Yamaha act like separate businesses and don’t talk to each other at all.
Porsche used to produce tractors, too. A friend of mine has a working vintage one (in Ferrari red!).
ETA: Daimler Benz are also all over the place in producing different vehicles. Besides luxury cars, they produce heavy trucks, buses, light vans (Sprinter) and universal heavy duty vehicles (Unimog).
ETA: also Rolls Royce. Best known for their luxury cars, I think their main business has always been aircraft engines.
ISTR if you own a Porsche tractor, that allows you to join the Porsche Club of America.
And that reminded me of IKEA, which is known for cheap flat-pack furniture, and meatballs.
Similar to this thread is the matter of Duncan Hines who, unlike Aunt Jemima or Betty Crocker, was a real person who really lived and breathed. He was a traveling salesman who sold printing supplies of something, and his travels took him hither and yon. He compiled lists of good places to eat, and within a couple of decades his name was synonymous with good food. So he partnered with a businessman to distribute cake, and the rest, as they say, is history. Hines himself could barely cook.
I recall a Porsche ad where a dealership serviced a Porsche 111 tractor that a guy brought in.
You haven’t met my cat
There was a British motorcycle manufacturer called BSA. The company started as Birmingham Small Arms in 1861, and made guns.
Jaguar cars began as the Swallow Sidecar Company, making sidecars for motorcycles.
GE made jet aircraft engines before spinning off that business into GE Aerospace.
Although they have since sold off that business, General Motors EMD division used to be one of the big makers of diesel locomotives.