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20 commercial failures from big companies
- Thread starter jw5
- Start date
Google Glass
A pair of glasses that could scan the area around you, translating text from other languages in real time and boasting all sorts of similar futuristic features, certainly felt like something out of a sci-fi movie. However with a price tag of US$1,500 and only three to five hours of battery life, Google Glass quickly became just an obscenely expensive piece of unattractive eyewear. The product was soon abandoned by Google as consumers chose to keep their tech in their phone rather than on their face.
New Coke
New Coke was such a colossal failure that some people even believe the whole thing was a conspiracy marketing technique. With the Pepsi Challenge campaign showing that people liked the sweeter taste of Pepsi, Coke tried to debut New Coke in 1985 by changing to a sweeter recipe. The problem is, sweeter soda is only more popular in smaller doses, which isn’t the way people typically drink beverages. The backlash was immense, and before long Coke Classic was brought back into the market with New Coke soon disappearing.
Pepsi A.M.
Turns out Coke isn’t the only soda giant that was making bad products in the 1980s. Pepsi A.M. was Pepsi’s new soda targeted at the ‘breakfast soda drinker,’ a demographic we’re not entirely sure has ever existed in significant numbers. Pepsi’s A.M. soda had 25% more caffeine in it than regular Pepsi as they attempted to capitalize on dwindling coffee consumption across America. Unfortunately for them, most people were unwilling to part with their hot coffee for some sugary soda first thing in the morning.
Nintendo’s Virtual Boy
Virtual reality technology is only just now starting to find its place in the gaming market, so it should come as no surprise that in 1995 the world was not ready for VR. Nintendo’s Virtual Boy was a clunky nightmare with terrible graphics, an awkward setup, and a hefty US$179.99 price tag. With less than 800,000 units sold, the Virtual Boy was easily Nintendo’s worst-selling console, especially when compared against the hit Nintendo 64 released just one year later.
Sony Betamax
The fact that a VHS tape is seen as a nostalgic piece of history and the Betamax is little more than a punchline shows who won the home video wars back in the ‘70s. Although Betamax was technically the more advanced technology, it failed against its counterpart as the VHS was able to store more footage, which meant entire movies could be kept on a single tape. With VHS tape VCRs quickly becoming more common in the average home, the Betamax slowly faded away.Google glass failed because it intruded others' privacy.
HD DVD
Sony learned its lesson from the Betamax failure and decades later won the high-definition war when their Blu-ray discs were victorious over Toshiba and NEC’s HD DVD. Sony made the smart move of putting Blu-ray players in all PlayStation 3s, meaning every gamer in the country had already made their decision. That said, HD DVDs may have been doomed from the start as they were able to hold only 15 GB of storage compared to Blu-ray’s 25 GB.
Coors Rocky Mountain Sparkling Water
Apparently Coors took to heart all the jokes about their beer tasting like water when they released their own Rocky Mountain Sparkling Water in 1990. Unfortunately, what they didn’t take to heart is that no one wants to buy water from a beer company. The Coors logo confused a lot of people who thought it was a beer product and avoided the drink entirely.
Burger King Satisfries
Burger King’s 2013 attempt to make a healthier french fry didn’t even last a single year as the fast-food giant both overestimated how much people wanted healthy fries and failed to even properly advertise to those who did. While Satisfries had 40% less fat and 30% less calories, they were also noticeably more expensive. Turns out people didn’t want to pay more money for something they didn’t even want in the first place.
Colgate Kitchen Entrees
Between 1960 and 1990 a lot of weird things happened, and at some point during this time, a toothpaste company decided to come out with its own line of frozen meals. While Colgate refutes they ever released frozen dinner products, evidence has been found dating back to 1966 detailing Colgate’s attempt to journey into ready-made entrees. Buying food from a toothpaste company is about as unappetizing as it gets, so it’s no surprise Colgate seems embarrassed by their past blunder.
Cosmopolitan Yogurts
While Cosmo’s attempt to transition from magazines to yogurt may not be as big a stretch as Colgate dinners, it is still another example of a company thinking too far out of the box. The line of Cosmopolitan Yogurt products didn’t even last for two years before being pulled off the shelf in 2001, as consumers collectively decided that they didn’t want to buy food from a fashion and gossip magazine.
Google+
Having a social media site that was invite-only when MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter were already dominating the internet doomed Google+ from the start. Even after the invite aspect was dropped, most people looked at Google+ and saw nothing worth moving away from Facebook for. Without people, a social media site is doomed to fail—which is exactly what this one did.
Mobile ESPN
ESPN also fell victim to wandering too far from their territory when the sports network tried to venture into the mobile phone market back in 2006. The phone offered its owners up-to-the-minute sports updates via a subscription service on its web browser. The only problem was that service cost between US$65-225 a month, not even including the US$300+ price tag on the phone itself.
Atari’s E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
E.T. was one of the most popular movies of all time, so a video game spinoff should be a hit, right? Unfortunately, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial is widely considered to be one of the worst games ever made due to countless glitches, a lack of actual gameplay or story, and a slew of other problems. Less than half of all printed copies were sold, with the remainder being buried in the desert, something many people considered an urban legend until it was proven true in 2015.
R.J. Reynolds smokeless cigarettes
When one of the world’s largest tobacco companies tried to debut smokeless cigarettes in 1988, they realized one important thing… smokers like smoke. Beyond missing out on the tactile elements of smoking, namely exhaling smoke and flicking sparks, smokers said the new product had an awful taste. Despite investing hundreds of millions of dollars into the product, R.J. Reynolds pulled it off shelves just a year later.
Oakley Thump
The sunglasses with a built-in MP3 player were not only a hideous departure from a brand known for its sleek fashion, but also ridiculously expensive. Priced at over US$500 in 2004, Oakley Thump was able to store about 60 songs with six hours of battery life. The problem of course was that, after those batteries that don’t even last through a full workday die, you’re just left with a pair of clunky sunglasses that look like a design nightmare.
Bic for Her
Apparently at some point in 2012, manufacturing company Bic decided pens weren’t feminine enough and released Bic for Her, a line of pastel-coloured pens meant for women. Needless to say, the backlash was immediate and immense, forcing the company to pull the product soon after it premiered—the craziest part being that this happened in the 2010s and not the 1960s.Similar threads
