Ford lost $250M on the Edsel, a car launched into a recession nobody wanted to buy

In the mid-1950s, Ford decided it needed a fourth brand — slotting between Ford and Mercury — to grab market share from General Motors and Chrysler. After years of research (and an infamous naming process that produced candidates like 'Mongoose Civique'), the company named it the Edsel, after Edsel Ford, the founder's son. Ford poured money into development, manufacturing and a huge advertising campaign, marketing the Edsel as the car of the future. It debuted on 'E Day,' September 4, 1957, with a prime-time TV special.

The timing was catastrophic. The Edsel launched just as a recession hit that hammered sales of medium-priced cars across the board. But the car itself didn't help: buyers found it overhyped, of questionable quality, and — most memorably — ugly, with a tall vertical grille that critics compared to a horse collar. The advanced features Ford had touted mattered less than the styling and the price in a downturn. Dealers who had signed up in droves watched the cars sit unsold.

Sales collapsed. Ford lost more than $250 million on the Edsel — over $2.7 billion in today's money — across development, manufacturing and marketing. In November 1959, barely two years after E Day, Ford quietly discontinued the brand. The Edsel became the most famous product flop in American business history, the standard against which all other failed launches are measured.