# Worst ideas by companies of all time? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 22, 2014, 10:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901 "2014-12-22T10:45:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 10:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/1 "2014-12-22T10:45:57Z")
I think I have to either nominate Gerber’s adult baby food, yes large jars of pureed baby food marketed to single adults! Ok beyond the texture issue, why exactly they thought single adults in particular would eat baby food is beyond me. Has to be one of the single most baffling ideas in business, check out the pic! [![](https://i.insider.com/4d4ad840cadcbba82e070000?width=1200) ](https://i.insider.com/4d4ad840cadcbba82e070000?width=1200) > **[The 11 Biggest Food Flops Of All Time](https://www.businessinsider.com/major-food-flops-2011-1?op=1)** Or something JohnClay on this very board brought to my attention, Lucent’s Inferno OS: > **[Inferno (operating system)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inferno_(operating_system))** > > Inferno is a distributed operating system started at Bell Labs and now developed and maintained by Vita Nuova Holdings as free software under the MIT License. Inferno was based on the experience gained with Plan 9 from Bell Labs, and the further research of Bell Labs into operating systems, languages, on-the-fly compilers, graphics, security, networking and portability. The name of the operating system, many of its associated programs, and that of the current company, were inspired by Dante Infer... > [@](#): > > Inferno programs are portable across a broad mix of hardware, networks, and environments. It defines a virtual machine, known as Dis, that can be implemented on any real machine, provides Limbo, a type-safe language that is compiled to portable byte code, and, more significantly, it includes a virtual operating system that supplies the same interfaces whether Inferno runs natively on hardware or runs as a user program on top of another operating system. > > A communications protocol called Styx is applied uniformly to access both local and remote resources, which programs use by calling standard file operations, open, read, write, and close. As of the fourth edition of Inferno, Styx is identical to Plan 9’s newer version of its hallmark 9P protocol, 9P2000. Why with demonic and underworld themed names this is sure to be a hit in the USA and other countries that are majority christian! :smack: The sad thing is no matter how good the OS was that naming pretty much guaranteed it would go nowhere. ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 11:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/2 "2014-12-22T11:09:35Z")
New Coke. Nuff said. ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 11:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/3 "2014-12-22T11:20:36Z")
> [@Terminus\_Est](#): > > New Coke. Nuff said. Well the idea of introducing a new variety of Coke with a taste closer to Pepsi which had gained market share wasn’t so out there, but why they replaced the original formula and stopped making it and at first did not even give any indication or marketing yea that was bafflingly stupid! If they had just introduced it alongside the original formula and called it Nu Coke or something as an alternative it probably would not have been such a blunder. > **[New Coke](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Coke)** > > New Coke was the unofficial name of a reformulation of the soft drink Coca-Cola, introduced by the Coca-Cola Company in April 1985. It was renamed Coke II in 1990, and discontinued in July 2002. > By 1985, Coca-Cola had been losing market share to diet soft drinks and non-cola beverages for several years. Blind taste tests suggested that consumers preferred the sweeter taste of the competing product Pepsi-Cola, and so the Coca-Cola recipe was reformulated. The American public reacted negatively,... ---
**Author:** ![Coriolanus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/coriolanus/32/18769_2.png) [@Coriolanus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Coriolanus)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 11:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/4 "2014-12-22T11:34:22Z")
This might be more of a poor decision, but Kodak did develop the first digital camera in 1975, but didn’t go any further because: > [@](#): > > Although Kodak developed a digital camera in 1975, the first of its kind, the product was dropped for fear it would threaten Kodak’s photographic film business > **[Kodak](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastman_Kodak)** > > The Eastman Kodak Company, referred to simply as Kodak (/ˈkoʊdæk/), is an American public company that produces various products related to its historic basis in film photography. The company is headquartered in Rochester, New York, and is incorporated in New Jersey. It is best known for photographic film products, which it brought to a mass market for the first time. > Kodak began as a partnership between George Eastman and Henry A. Strong to develop a film roll camera. After the release of the... ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 11:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/5 "2014-12-22T11:43:11Z")
It’s a shame that Blizzard or Lamborghini didn’t sell any Diablo(s). Or countless things called Devil or Demon. Or the Towering Inferno. And naming something after something that make most people think fire and not hell. It’s not called Hail Beezelbub OS. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 11:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/6 "2014-12-22T11:45:07Z")
> [@grude](#): > > Well the idea of introducing a new variety of Coke with a taste closer to Pepsi which had gained market share wasn’t so out there, but why they replaced the original formula and stopped making it and at first did not even give any indication or marketing yea that was bafflingly stupid! If they had just introduced it alongside the original formula and called it Nu Coke or something as an alternative it probably would not have been such a blunder. > > [New Coke - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Coke) From what I understand, the new flavor tested well with focus groups. However, because they didn’t ask what the focus groups would think if they replaced the old formula with the new, they assumed that the new flavor going over well was all they needed to consider, and did the swap. They didn’t realize how much they’d succeeded in getting the old formula’s claws into the American mindset. ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 11:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/7 "2014-12-22T11:49:53Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > It’s a shame that Blizzard or Lamborghini didn’t sell any Diablo(s). Or countless things called Devil or Demon. Or the Towering Inferno. And naming something after something that make most people think fire and not hell. It’s not called Hail Beezelbub OS. One of those is a videogame where you fight monsters marketed to the younger crowd, like Doom. Towering Inferno is a movie. Inferno was a OS who depended on stuffy middle aged professional office types for adoption and success, different market where the name was more likely to be an issue. ---
**Author:** ![RobDog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f07891/32.png) [@RobDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RobDog)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 11:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/8 "2014-12-22T11:54:25Z")
How about nearly ruining yourselves: > **[Hoover free flights promotion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoover_free_flights_promotion)** > > The Hoover free flights promotion was a marketing promotion run by the British division of the Hoover Company in late 1992. The promotion, aiming to boost sales during the global recession of the early 1990s, offered two complimentary round-trip plane tickets to the United States, worth about £600, to any customer purchasing at least £100 in Hoover products. Hoover had been experiencing dwindling sales as a result of the economic downturn and a sharp increase in competing brands. Hoover was co Co... ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/9 "2014-12-22T12:31:23Z")
> [@grude](#): > > Inferno was a OS who depended on stuffy middle aged professional office types for adoption and success, different market where the name was more likely to be an issue. No, the IT staffs make those choices and they’re fine with the names. One of the main concepts in Unix systems is daemons and no one bats an eye. Heck, the OS is a corruptions of eunuchs and most folks don’t notice. I think this was a non-issue. ---
**Author:** ![dalej42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@dalej42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dalej42)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/10 "2014-12-22T13:00:49Z")
Alamo Rent A Car spent lots of money to renovate their rental facilities in their major locations . A changing room, playground, even a concession stand. They didn’t do the common sense idea of better staffing the rental office so people wouldn’t have to wait in line for an hour! No need for a playground or concessions when you’re in and out of the rental office in less than 10 minutes. ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/11 "2014-12-22T14:10:25Z")
It would be hard to imagine a worse decision than that described by **RobDog** above. This one: > [@](#): > > Although Kodak developed a digital camera in 1975, the first of its kind, the product was dropped for fear it would threaten Kodak’s photographic film business reminds me of the decision by IBM around 1986 not to sell a microcomputer based on the 386 chip because it would likely interfere with their minicomputer business. They were right about that, but Compaq had no reason not to sell such a computer and, although IBM later did sell such a computer, they were late to the party and eventually exited the micro business that they had caused to take off. I am not saying they started it, but they made it respectable for small businesses. Forty years earlier, IBM had declined to get into the business of making computers because they anticipated a world wide demand of at most five computers. Then there was the decision of Time-Life to buy AOL, whose main buisness (selling dialup internet access) was obviously going down the tubes. Xerox had a research arm in Palo Alto that invented the mouse, the graphical user interface and other things, but the suits back east were not interested since it had nothing to do with the copier business. Their inventions heavily influenced Apple, among others. Back in the 19th century, Western Union turned down the possibility of buying the telephone because they could not see any demand. They imagined, I assume, that to use it, both parties would have to come to a local telegraph office to talk. They did not imagine that every office and, eventually, every home, would have an instrument. Gary Killdall made a disastrous decision to go out flying the day IBM came to call. I could go on all day, but I’ll stop here. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/12 "2014-12-22T14:38:54Z")
> [@Leaper](#): > > From what I understand, the new flavor tested well with focus groups. However, because they didn’t ask what the focus groups would think if they replaced the old formula with the new, they assumed that the new flavor going over well was all they needed to consider, and did the swap. They didn’t realize how much they’d succeeded in getting the old formula’s claws into the American mindset. There are grains of truth to all this, but it really comes down to two blunders. The new formula was given extremely wide taste-testing, but the test groups judged the flavor from a small sample - about two sips’ worth - and even then it was well-known that first-bite/whole portion judgments can vary considerably. That is, people preferred New Coke over Pepsi in a small sip, but Coke drinkers preferred the old flavor by the can. (The second blunder was the misjudgment of the market’s real and tradition-driven desire for the old flavor, and doing the complete replacement rather than rolling it out as a new flavor. But the first step off the cliff was the bungled taste-testing.) ---
**Author:** ![Claverhouse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/13edae/32.png) [@Claverhouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Claverhouse)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/13 "2014-12-22T16:18:04Z")
> [@grude](#): > > [Inferno (operating system) - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inferno_(operating_system)) > > Why with demonic and underworld themed names this is sure to be a hit in the USA and other countries that are majority christian! :smack: The sad thing is no matter how good the OS was that naming pretty much guaranteed it would go nowhere. **[Qubes](https://qubes-os.org/)**, possibly the most secure operating system, hasn’t caught fire anymore than Inferno. At some point one has to get past the names and realise most people don’t give a toss about operating systems, nor security, nor nomenclature: but will just take the default. Because it just almost works. ---
**Author:** ![oft\_wears\_hats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/7993a0/32.png) [@oft\_wears\_hats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oft_wears_hats)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/14 "2014-12-22T17:21:51Z")
Red Lobster’s infamous [“endless snow crab legs” promotion](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Lobster#Promotions) has to be somewhere in the Hall of Fame. It may not have been as costly or disastrous as a lot of other corporate bungles, but I think it gets extra points for just how poorly thought out and implemented it was. [QUOTE=Wikipedia] Red Lobster has offered an endless snow crab leg promotion twice in its history. However, in 2003, the promotion resulted in parent company Darden Restaurants taking a $3 million charge to third quarter earnings, resulting in president Edna Morris’ departure from the company. The ill-timed promotion was launched amid high wholesale crab leg prices. The chain also underestimated how many times a guest would order more. Further complicating matters at the restaurant level was the amount of time a guest spent table-side in the restaurant cracking crab legs. This resulted in increased wait times in the lobby and overall diminished guest capacity per hour. [/QUOTE] On top of all that, I understand that they didn’t predict customers picking the easy meat out of each leg, leaving the rest, and ordering more, further reducing their margins. I don’t have a cite for that last bit, though. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/15 "2014-12-22T17:31:03Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > It’s a shame that Blizzard or Lamborghini didn’t sell any Diablo(s). Or countless things called Devil or Demon. Or the Towering Inferno. And naming something after something that make most people think fire and not hell. It’s not called Hail Beezelbub OS. However, I’ve heard that Windows [XP](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chi_Rho) at one point was the #1 OS used by Christians. ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/16 "2014-12-22T17:41:51Z")
nm ---
**Author:** ![Greg\_Charles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/839c29/32.png) [@Greg\_Charles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greg_Charles)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/17 "2014-12-22T17:47:49Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > Then there was the decision of Time-Life to buy AOL, whose main buisness (selling dialup internet access) was obviously going down the tubes. For that matter, AOL had previously bought Netscape, somehow forgetting that the official AOL browser had to be IE or Microsoft would take away the “Signup for AOL” icon that appeared in new installations of Windows. Being bought and then ignored by AOL was the final death knell for Netscape. ---
**Author:** ![Infovore](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/infovore/32/420_2.png) [@Infovore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Infovore)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/18 "2014-12-22T18:04:18Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > Xerox had a research arm in Palo Alto that invented the mouse, the graphical user interface and other things, but the suits back east were not interested since it had nothing to do with the copier business. Their inventions heavily influenced Apple, among others. I used to work for Xerox, right down the hill from Palo Alto Research Center, back in the late '80s-early '90s. We heard these stories all the time, and even had a name for those executives: “toner-heads.” Xerox/PARC not only invented the mouse and the GUI, but Ethernet, laser printers, and the touchpad. There’s a book called “Fumbling the Future” that describes how they lost control of all of their best inventions, which went on to make a lot of money for other companies (including Apple and Adobe, which was started by a former Xeroxer who got frustrated at the company’s failure to market ideas.) ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/19 "2014-12-22T18:18:59Z")
> [@grude](#): > > I think I have to either nominate Gerber’s adult baby food, yes large jars of pureed baby food marketed to single adults! Ok beyond the texture issue, why exactly they thought single adults in particular would eat baby food is beyond me. Has to be one of the single most baffling ideas in business, check out the pic! > > [http://static6.businessinsider.com/image/4d4ad840cadcbba82e070000-1200/gerber-singles.jpg](http://static6.businessinsider.com/image/4d4ad840cadcbba82e070000-1200/gerber-singles.jpg) > > [The 11 Biggest Food Flops of All Time - Business Insider](http://www.businessinsider.com/major-food-flops-2011-1?op=1) So, Gerber basically created Bachelor Chow? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2014, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901/20 "2014-12-22T18:35:26Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > Xerox had a research arm in Palo Alto that invented the mouse, the graphical user interface and other things, but the suits back east were not interested since it had nothing to do with the copier business. Their inventions heavily influenced Apple, among others. > > . 1.) Xerox didn’t invent the mouse. Douglas Engelbart of SRI did. There are contemporary films of him describing it. Apparently the trackball was invented even earlier > **[Computer mouse](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mouse_(computing))** > > A computer mouse (plural mice, also mouses)\[nb 1\] is a hand-held pointing device that detects two-dimensional motion relative to a surface. This motion is typically translated into the motion of the pointer (called a cursor) on a display, which allows a smooth control of the graphical user interface of a computer. > The first public demonstration of a mouse controlling a computer system was done by Doug Engelbart in 1968 as part of the Mother of All Demos. Mice originally used two separate whe... 2.) Xerox PARC was in existence for three decades before it divested. It’s still going strong. If “the suits back east” weren’t interested in what they were doing, they had a funny way of showing it by continuing to fund them. > **[PARC (company)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PARC_(company))** > > SRI Future Concepts Division (formerly Palo Alto Research Center, PARC and Xerox PARC) is a research and development company in Palo Alto, California. It was founded in 1969 by Jacob E. "Jack" Goldman, chief scientist of Xerox Corporation, as a division of Xerox, tasked with creating computer technology-related products and hardware systems. > Xerox PARC has been foundational to numerous revolutionary computer developments, including laser printing, Ethernet, the modern personal computer, GUI (... [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worst-ideas-by-companies-of-all-time/707901.md?page=2)