With such ubiquitous brands, how the hell did they manage to accrue 500 MILLION in debt
They spent it on watering down their brand:
The combined company soon expanded the Instant brand name into new products beyond its eponymous cooking device, including air purifiers and coffee machines.
And ruined the brands they did have, example pyrex vs PYREX.
I just learned about that difference not too long ago. Looked in my kitchen, and yep, “pyrex”.
… There’s a difference?
Absolutely! PYREX is borosilicate glass. Very durable and especially good at sharp temperature changes e.g. a food container straight from the fridge to the microwave, or hot leftovers put away in the fridge.
pyrex all Lowercase is sodium glass, still strong to scratches and mild drop damage but malleable and easier to mold into shapes, also cheaper. Does not hold up to sharp temperature changes and will actually crack or worst case explode.
I found the following comment on HN fairly insightful:
That’s why my guess was going to be: “financialization” … buy the company, profit like crazy by selling it assets and taking on debt, cut R&D budgets, cut marketing, provide fat compensation for C-suite and board… bankruptcy ~5 years later after someone else is holding the bag. The playbook is practically as American as baseball these days. Even more so when tax payers get to pay for the bail out.
I’ve seen it happen first hand, not all the way to bankruptcy, fortunately…
It’s depressing to me how parasitic executives have become in American business. I think we need to bolster our laws to further make it illegal to drive businesses into the ground in this way. Cap how much executives can profit off of our system. As it is, something clearly needs to change. The current way of things is infinite growth prioritizing short term gains at the expense of long term stability to the point of failure at which point the business crumbles and c suite execs jump out with their golden parachutes. Then those execs can go on to run other newer healthier companies into the ground as well. It’s all so flagrant too. We all see it happening but nothing can be done until our government steps up to the plate.
The answer is that we need to put a hard cap on how many people that corporation can employ and after a certain size of company/corporation, it need to be forcibly converted to Worker Cooperatives. Basically in worker cooperatives, the workers are the shareholders, not the leecher and workers can also vote in people to lead the company as well as dismissing that boss if something happen.
Wish that people explore Worker Cooperatives more, it’s an alternative that works.
That’s bad news. We bought an Instant Pot last year and are really happy with that purchase. Hopefully they can manage to turn this around in some way, it would be bad if the Instant Pot would disappear from the US and Canadien market.
I just heard some supposedly inspirational blurb on the radio about a guy getting let go in the 2008 financial crisis, and going on to invent the instant pot. Funny little thing. It’s a great device (my mother loves hers). Hopefully the product continues on past the bankruptcy.
Insane that they took out such a big loan to make shitty home electronics. Probably should’ve stuck to the Instant Pot.
Instant Pot is the perfect gift for when you send your kid off to college. Everyone I know has one of these things. It’s better than a crock pot, the thing actually locks and I can throw it on the floor in the back of my car for a potluck.
PYREX or pyrex?
Both. PYREX would be products produced by Corning, though they may also produce some pyrex products, but pyrex is also the name licensed out to other companies
