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Quote of the Day
“If you gave me $100 billion and said take away the soft drink leadership of Coca-Cola in the world, I’d give it back to you and say it can’t be done.”
-Warren Buffett. On this day in 1985, Coca-Cola tried its best to relinquish that leadership. For more, read below…
April 23rd – This Day in Stock Market History
April 23rd, 1985 – New Coke is released, changing up the iconic soft drink’s recipe for the first time in 99 years.
Today the attempted switch to “New Coke” is considered one of the prime examples of poor marketing decisions. The move would bring months of terrible PR for the company, and upset lifetime customers of the brand. At the peak of the pushback, Coca-Cola was receiving 1,500 calls per day to complain about the change.
On July 10th 1985, Coca-Cola would announce that is would begin reselling the original recipe as “Coca-Cola classic”. The news would make the front pages of newspapers nationwide:
As bad as the move was from a marketing perspective, it had very little impact on the shares of Coca-Cola. In fact, in 1985 Coca-Cola’s shares would be up nearly 35%, and would continue to be a stellar investment through the 80’s and 90’s:
If you want more history on the failed roll out of New Coke, Coca-Cola’s website has a very interesting summary here: https://www.coca-colacompany.com/stories/coke-lore-new-coke
Also, be sure to check out our Read of the Day below where we look at Coca-Cola from Warren Buffett’s perspective at the time he first purchased the shares 3 years later.
April 23rd, 1999 – Theglobe dot com is delisted from the Nasdaq, closing the day at 16 cents per share.
The homepage of Theglobe.com, which had its IPO on this day, November 13th, 1998.
Just a year a half after it’s IPO on November 13, 1998 where it rose 606% to a close of $63.50. At its peak, Theglobe had a market cap of about $880 million.
The company had reported a net loss of $11 million through the first 9 months of the year, on revenue of just $2.7 million.
Believe it or not you can still buy theglobe stock today. It is traded over-the-counter (OTC) under the ticker symbol TGLO. Shares have a ways to go still to get back to their tech bubble highs:
Best April 23rd in Dow Jones Industrial Average History
1898 – Up 1.55%, 0.50 points.
Worst April 23rd in Dow Jones Industrial Average History
1936 – Down 2.48%, 3.84 points.
Read of the Day
Buffett would not begin investing in Coca-Cola until 3 years after the New Coke debacle.
We looked at Coca-Cola stock through the eyes of Warren Buffet in a previous post here:
Throwback Thursday: A look at Buffett’s 1988 investment in Coca-Cola
Go To Next Day: April 24th, 1901 – First signs of trouble in the Panic of 1901, would set up one of the wildest days in NYSE history 2 weeks later –>
