The World's Dumbest Marketing Decisions
December 22nd 2009 01:03
Big Mistake Decca . . . Big Mistake
There's bound to be more but here are just a few to get you started.
1) Turning Down The Beatles
Mike Smith and Dick Rowe, executives in charge of evaluating new talent for the London office of Decca Records.Legend has it that Rowe told the band’s manager that the label wasn’t interested, because they sounded too much like a popular group called The Shadows.
In one of the most famous of all rejection lines, he said: "Not to mince words, Mr. Epstein, but we don’t like your boys’ sound. Groups are out; four-piece groups with guitars particularly are finished."
Google's founders originally tried to sell the software to several tech companies before deciding to make a go of it on their own - because no one liked the million dollar selling price they were seeking. Ouch!
Women are from Venus - Idiots from Mars
John and Forrest Mars, the owners of Mars Inc., makers of M&M’s turned down a request from Universal Studios for permission to use M&M’s in a new film they were making.
The director they were told was looking for a cross-promotion. He’d use the M&M’s, and Mars could help promote the movie.
The film was E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial, directed by Stephen Spielberg.
Other clangers include
"This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." -- Western Union internal memo, 1876.
"No flying machine will ever fly from New York to Paris." -- Orville Wright.
"Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value." -- Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre.
"So we went to Atari and said, 'Hey, we've got this amazing thing, even built with some of your parts, and what do you think about funding us? Or we'll give it to you. We just want to do it. Pay our salary, we'll come work for you.' And they said, 'No.' So then we went to Hewlett-Packard, and they said, 'Hey, we don't need you. You haven't got through college yet.'"
- Apple Computer Inc. founder Steve Jobs on attempts to get Atari and H-P interested in his and Steve Wozniak's personal computer.
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