Investing in a business can be fun. After all, capitalism is the very essence of the American dream mantra.

The SBA states that because of investing and capitalism, there was an addition of over 400,000 businesses in America in  2019, taking the tally of total businesses in the country to over 30 million. It takes determination and hard work to run a successful business, which is why around 20% of businesses fail in their very first year.

Pexels | It takes a lot to keep your brand’s doors open

If you miss your favorite Bugle Boy jeans and want to reminisce about them, or you happen to wonder what was behind the decline of Jelly-O Pudding Pops’, keep reading because we have compiled a list of some of the most popular brands that do not exist anymore.

1. Kudos

Kudos was introduced by Mars as a granola bar snack. When it comes to why this delicious breakfast snack was removed from the retail shelves, we’re all at a loss. Although the manufacturer would later come up with an official announcement about the discontinuation of Kudos, fans never got an explanation as to why Mars suddenly pulled the plug on their favorite snack.

2. Pontiac

In 1926, Pontiac was introduced by General Motors as a sister brand of the Chevrolet. This line of motorcars offered several performance vehicles such as the Sunfire, Fiero, and Solstice. Althjough all of these models were introduced to keep the company afloat in hopes of a boost in sales an revenue, by 2009, however, due to low profits and declining sales numbers, General Motors finally discontinued the Pontiac brand altogether.

Pexels | You can’t create a sustainable business without customers

3. Netscape Navigator

Back in the ‘90s, Netscape was one of the most commonly used net browsers. The service was introduced in 1993, and at one point, its software was maintained by over 5,000 employees. Soon after, however, Microsoft came up with their own internet browser that was created to rival and best all of the existing browsers. As a result, Netscape Navigator’s user base slowly dwinlded and the company was later taken under the ownership of AOL before getting officially shut down in 2008.

4. Bugle Boy

In the 1980s, Bugle Boy quickly gained fame for their fashionable parachute pants. After a successful ad campaign on tv that posed the questioned, “excuse me, are those Bugle Boy jeans you’re wearing?,” people started to take notice of the up-and-coming fashion brand. Despite its initial success,Bugle Boy found it difficult to keep up with constantly evolving trends and ostruggled to opne outlets across the United States, which is why, by the time the year 2001 came along, the company was already bankrupt.

Pexels | Imagine finding out your favorite brand is going out of business – what would you do?

5. Orbitz

Orbitz was released in 1997 as a soda with textural enhancement. As it turned out, the product became an epic fail because the world did not seem to like the gelatinous blobs in the soda as they reminded them of cough syrup. As a result, this product only remained on the shelves for a year before being discontinued.

How many of these obsolete brands did you know about? For us, the closure of Bugle Boy hit a little too close to home.