10 of the worst product flops ever
From weird snack food ingredients to a poorly timed car, here are some ideas that should have been left on the drawing board.
Some products are classic hits. An inexpensive home carbonator that lets you make your own soda? Ingenious. A button in your car that opens your garage door? Amazing.Jell-O that tastes like celery? Aweso. . . wait a minute. What?
For every hit product, there are dozens of flops. Ideas that looked good on paper, but failed to catch on with consumers. Some products were good, but edged out by smarter competitors. Other products, like an early tablet computer from Apple (AAPL), were simply ahead of their time.
Perhaps no product is more closely associated with failure than the Edsel, the Ford Motor (F) automobile that lost hundreds of millions of dollars after it was introduced in 1957. Edsel was back in the news recently when its designer, Roy Brown Jr., died in Michigan at the age of 96.
But the Edsel is not alone in the product hall of shame. We asked around MSN Money and came up with 10 of the worst product flops in history. Click here to see them.
The HD DVD reminded me of the LaserDisc. Those sure weren't around for long.
How about the Yugo? After just a couple of years dealers were closing and practically giving them away. The same thing happened last year with the Think electric car.
Microsoft wasn't immune... remember "Microsoft Bob"? Back during the Windows 3 days it was supposed to be a more user-friendly GUI, but it was clumsy and hokey.
Among those dot-bombs was a company that used a sock puppet as its mascot. Advertised heavily, but for the life of me I can't remember its name or product.
MORE ON MSN MONEY
DATA PROVIDERS
Copyright © 2013 Microsoft. All rights reserved.
Fundamental company data and historical chart data provided by Morningstar Inc. Real-time index quotes and delayed quotes supplied by Morningstar Inc. Quotes delayed by up to 15 minutes, except where indicated otherwise. Fund summary, fund performance and dividend data provided by Morningstar Inc. Analyst recommendations provided by Zacks Investment Research. StockScouter data provided by Verus Analytics. IPO data provided by Hoover's Inc. Index membership data provided by Morningstar Inc.
STOCK SCOUTER
StockScouter rates stocks from 1 to 10, with 10 being the best, using a system of advanced mathematics to determine a stock's expected risk and return. Ratings are displayed on a bell curve, meaning there will be fewer ratings of 1 and 10 and far more of 4 through 7.
138 | 288 | 457 | 666 | 712 | 619 | 673 | 446 | 271 | 120 |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 |
LATEST POSTS
Plus, after much ado, Softbank is oh-so-close to acquiring Sprint.
FIDELITY VIEWPOINTS
- How to sell covered calls - Fidelity Investments
- Savvy year-end tax moves to consider now - Fidelity Investments
- Seven ways to prepare for tax changes
- Five reasons an annual review is crucial - Fidelity Investments
- Take a look at mid caps now - Fidelity Investments
- State of the sector: Health care - Fidelity Investments
VIDEO ON MSN MONEY
ABOUT
Top Stocks provides analysis about the most noteworthy stocks in the market each day, combining some of the best content from around the MSN Money site and the rest of the Web.
Contributors include professional investors and journalists affiliated with MSN Money.
Follow us on Twitter @topstocksmsn.