33 High-Profile Mistakes and Missteps That You Have No Excuse to Make Yourself

Lose billions of dollars today? No? Then you’re doin’ alright!
33 High-Profile Mistakes and Missteps That You Have No Excuse to Make Yourself

Aw, you accidentally put salt in your coffee instead of sugar? Boo hoo. That’s nothing compared to some of these multi-billion dollar losses. It’s like we always say, billionaires have it so rough. Your little salt mishap may have been seen by one or two coworkers in the break room, but some of these blunders became headlines worldwide.

So the next time you trip on a curb or rear-end someone, just think about the plight of the billionaire and be grateful you’re not one of them.

Yahoo!

CRACKED Tumblr - Home t of Fandom Memes tumblr. Search OPEN 4.4 17+ No75 ***** - - What's New version History 101 adidas thanks to choising Tumblr a place to connect with others over shared interests Preview YAHOO! In 2013, Yahoo acquired Tumblr for $1.1 billion, but the platform struggled to become profitable and was eventually sold to Automattic for $3 million in 2019.

PayNow.com

A promotion gave gamblers an easy way to beat the house. A K When the online casino PlayNow.com offered a $100 bonus to whoever bet another $100, savvy gamblers figured out they could play baccarat betting $50 on themselves and $50 on the dealer. Whatever the result, they'd break even-and then they'd be entitled to the bonus, effectively doubling their money before walking away. CRACKED.COM

Elon Musk

CRACKED $182 BILLION IN A LITTLE MORE THAN A YEAR In January 2023, Elon Musk had lost a huge amount of money - around $182 billion - since November 2021, which was the biggest loss of personal fortune ever recorded.

Papa John’s

GM AWARD A D. AWA PAPA JOHNS Better Ingredients. Better Pizza John FREE PIZZA with CORPORATE CRASH & BURN paRewards @PAPAJORNS.COM PIZZA BEING RACIST PAPA JO Better Ing Better AT WORK John Schnatter, the founder Scan to GO MOBILE with R of Papa John's, stepped down as chairman in 2018 after it was revealed that he had used a racial slur during a conference call. CRACKED

Merrill Lynch

CORPORATE CRASH & BURN ASSAULTING A BARISTA Merrill Lynch let go of James lannazzo in 2021, after a video of him swearing and throwing a drink at a smoothie worker went viral on TikTok. CRACKED

News Corp.

CRACKED ОБЛЕН NECTI SOUTH AX JR HER #News Corporation boliet NEWS CORP. News Corp. sold Myspace for $35 million, a huge loss compared to the $580 million they paid for it in 2005.

Sam Bankman-Fried

CRACKED $14.6 BILLION IN A DAY In November 2022, Sam Bankman-Fried, the head of FTX, lost a lot of money - about $14.6 billion - in a single day, after he made a deal with Binance to get some help.

Atari

CRACKED COM AIATARI LYNX released a Marlboro-branded version of their handheld, LYNX, in Germany. It came with Marlboro Go, a dirt bike racing game, because nothing goes better with a cigarette than a dirt bike. MARLBORO ABENTEUER TEAM +

Blackberry

In 2010, Blackberry hired actresses to flirt with men in bars. dull The goal was to hand the guy her Blackberry and have him enter his number. CRACKED.COM

Audi

33 High-Profile Mistakes and Missteps That You Have No Excuse to Make Yourself

Trump and ACN

From 2006 to 2015, Donald Trump promoted video phones made by ACN, a multi-level marketing company. ACN Trump distanced himself from ACN when he began his presidential campaign. CRACKED.COM

LifeLock

Eager to promote confidence in his company's identity theft protection services, the CEO of LifeLock Social Security used campaign. his number actual in stock advertising Perhaps fell victim to identity theft. Thirteen times. My Social Security # is: As a result, 457-55-5462 LifeLock was LifeLock. accused of Guarantee Your Good Name deceptive advertising and fined $12 million. Guarantee Your Good Name Then again, five years later. This time for $100 million. GRAGKED.COM

Citibank

CRACKED CITIBANK Citibank made a mistake and accidentally sent $900 million to the wrong people, and the lenders refused to return the money. The lenders were taking advantage of the situation due to a longer running saga between them and Revlon, the company that borrowed the money.

Curt Schilling

T CURT Cn 1 1 SCHILLING RE 5 38 STUDIOS TOP LOCAL STORY Schilling Addresses 38 Studios Failure CRACKED.COM Leave Schilling's politics out of this and just call him a dopey business man. The World Series hero blew $50 million on a fledgling video game company, along with $75 O PT million in Rhode Island taxpayer money. By the time he was done settling lawsuits, it was Game Over for his entire big league bankroll of $115 million. 70

The 13th Warrior

CRACKED THE 13TH WARRIOR MONEY LOST: $100M+ The movie was a riff on Beowulf, and was based on a novel by Michael Chrichton. Despite big-name inspiration, it's estimated to have lost up to $130 million (in 1999 dollars).

Google

Google had to pay a combined $522.5 million for their shady business Total practices. Google GRAGKED.COM Google paid fines for illegal data collection, knowingly allowing fraudulent pharmacies to advertise on their site, and were accused of profiting from women sex trafficking.

Bad Promo

An Indonesian marketing expert thought it would be a good idea to throw money out of a plane. Instead of a traditional campaign for his book, Tung Desem Waringin circled the soccer stadium in Serang, tossing roughly $10,000 on people who, on average, make $40/ month. The stunt ended up with a 13-year-old girl being hospitalized after collapsing in the crowd. CRACKED COM

Ross Perot

CRACKED ALMOST HALF A BILLION DOLLARS IN ONE DAY On April 22, 1986, Ross Perot lost a huge amount of money - the most ever in one day, at that point - when the stock of his company, E.D.S., dropped from $150 to $85. It was a loss of $450 million.

DaimlerChrysler

CRACKED DAIMLER DaimlerChrysler agreed to sell an 80% stake in its struggling U.S. brand Chrysler to Cerberus Capital Management for $7.4 billion, with Daimler expecting to pay out about $650 million to close the deal and take a $4-5.4 billion profit hit. The sale allowed Daimler to end its exposure to billions in ongoing losses and health care costs.

Gerald Ratner

CRACKED CORPORATE CRASH & BURN SAYING THE QUIET PART OUT LOUD Gerald Ratner, the CEO of a jewelry group, made a speech in 1991 that included the musing: People say, 'how can you sell this for such a low price?' I say 'because it's total crap. His careless words are now known as doing a Ratner, and cost his company a whooping £500 million.

British Airways

BRITISH BIG OOPS! LOSING TENS OF MILLIONS ON A PROMOTION In 1992, Hoover offered British customers two free flights to the U.S. if they bought something worth more than £100. Unfortunately, this promotion ended up costing the company £48 million, and three senior executives were let go. CRACKED

DiGiorno

DiGiorno jumped on a domestic abuse hashtag DIGIORNO DiGiorno Pizza @DiGiornoPizza #WhyIStayed You had pizza. 9/8/14, 11:11 PM GRAGKED.COM The social media person or DiGiorno clearly didn't do their research before tweeting out a joke on a trending hashtag. The hashtag was in defense of domestic abuse victims.

Matt Damon

Matt Damon's crypto firm sent someone $10.5 million instead of $100, and they can't get it back. GRAGKED.COM Crypto.com didn't discover that millions of dollars had gone to an Australian woman until seven months later, at which point the money was either spent or transferred.

McDonald’s

CRACKED M MCDONALD'S BEEFED UP THEIR VEGETABLE OIL. When McDonald's switched from beef fat to vegetable oil to cook their fries, they forgot to mention that the vegetable oil still contained beef products. A lawsuit awarded $10 million to Hindu and vegetarian groups.

Andi Owen

CRACKED BEING ASKED BY EMPLOYEES ABOUT WHETHER THEY'LL GET A BONUS Andi Owen, the CEO of a high-end office furniture company, totally lost it when some of her employees asked about staying motivated if they don't get annual bonuses. Even though she makes a $4.9 million salary, she told them to leave Pity City.

Samsung

CRACKED SAMSUNG Samsung Securities Co CEO Koo Sung-hoon resigned after the company was punished by South Korea's financial regulator for an employee's error that sparked a $105 billion ghost stock blunder. The company was handed a six month partial suspension of its operations and its chief was suspended for three months.

Sears

CRACKED.COM SEARS Sears was ruined by Ayn Rand's ideas. In 2008, Sears' CEO (and Rand fan) Eddie Lampert split the company into divisions ordered to selfishly compete against each other. The result was a steady death spiral that eventually led the century-old company to bankruptcy.

Pets.com

CRACKED JEFF BEZOS Pets.com was an ambitious online pet store that was funded by Amazon and had a sock puppet mascot, but it failed miserably due to its high advertising costs and inability to generate revenue.

Trump Steaks

Donald Trump's Exclusive Introduction worst TRUMP business idea STEAKS THE WORLD'S GREATEST STEAK ever (maybe). Trump Steaks were (for some reason) sold at the Sharper Image. Sharper Image CEO Jerry Levin called it a horrible business idea, saying, We literally sold almost no steaks. If we sold $50,000 worth of steaks in total, I'd be surprised. CRACKED

McDonald’s Japan

M WAGON In 2006, McDonald's Japan ran a promotion in which 10,000 mp3 players would be awarded to lucky customers. The players contained a virus which stole data when connected to a computer. McDonald's had to provide the winners with an antivirus program and replace the players. GRAGKED.COM

Pay by Touch

13 PAY BY 167 RU Hondersator TOUCH SOLK PAY BY TOUCH place center a finger flat 8 sensor OV press and hold 3 wait green B light GRACKED.COM This company used biometrics for payments back in 2002. But the CEO was caught in a bunch of scandals (embezzling, drugs, domestic abuse), and the company went bust before smartphones were even invented.

Actionable Insights

CRACKED CORPORATE CRASH & BURN BEING RACIST IN A BAR Jason Wood, the CEO of Actionable Insights, stepped down from his job in July 2020 after a video of him making a racist comment in a Fresno bar spread around the internet.

Clearlink

CRACKED CEO PRAISES EMPLOYEE FOR SACRIFICING THEIR PET FOR THE OFFICE. James Clarke, the CEO of Clearlink, had a meeting with the staff where he praised a worker who had to give away their pet dog because the company was making them come back to the office. God bless America, or something.

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