General Mills - Bigger Than You Know

[Music] i should say up front that for a video about general mills there will be surprisingly little serial talk i'm gonna keep it to an absolute minimum and instead talk about everything else they've done over the years which i think is way more than you would expect i can almost guarantee that you're going to be surprised by something that i say in this video if not almost everything the roots of the company go back to 1866 and here's a good question do you know the first ever cereal introduced by general mills you might think that it's cheerios but it was actually wheaties they came out in 1924 meaning the company that became general mills existed for over 50 years before ever selling cereal and for over 70 years before selling cheerios before that it was all about flour i think most people have used or at least seen a gold medal flower it's been one of the top brands going back to the 1800s it's put out by general mills and is the thing that started this massively diverse company see this guy named washburn started this flower mill in minneapolis and then three years later this guy named pillsbury started a competing flower mill in the same city that competition was good for the industry the great washburn pillsbury milling rivalry as i like to call it led to technological advances and turn minneapolis into the flower milling capital of the country then in 1880s cincinnati was hosting the first international millers exhibition as part of it washburn entered his flower into their contest and it won the gold medal now that may have turned into one of the most publicized gold medals in history because soon after the victory motivated him to adopt the name gold medal as the brand of his flower so the company that we all associate with breakfast cereals did not start that way in fact when wheaties was introduced their original name was much lengthier it was called washburn's gold metal whole wheat flakes meaning that there was a time when they were so well known for their flour that they felt it was almost necessary to associate it with any other products that they developed i should mention that general mills was officially formed in 1928 when washburn's company was merged together with 27 other smaller mills from around the country the idea was that they can all continue operating the same as before but then they would have the benefit of centralized product development and advertising that leads me to the next one which may be a little more unexpected a radio station in 1924 there was a struggling radio station out of minneapolis called wlag it was forced to shut down and then saved when it was bought by the company that would become general mills at that time they were called washburn crosby company named after the founder and an early partner so to help advertise the brand they changed the call letters to wcco to represent washburn crosby company they called themselves the gold medal station to promote their brand of flower and it just seemed like a great way to grow and diversify while better promoting their business if you remember wheaties was first sold the same year they bought this radio station so in 1926 they started promoting it by airing one of the first ever jingles sung by the once famous wheaties quartet [Music] the sales for the cereal were noticeably higher in the areas that got the radio station suggesting that the whole effort was effective and i would go as far as to say that without it we may not have wheaties or any other general meal cereals today they did sell the station in 1932 to cbs for the price of 450 000 and it still exists today in minneapolis it's on am radio frequency 830 and it's on tv cbs channel 4 still labeled as wcco and that's where those letters come from next up is mechanics this one had a logical start but quickly blew up into something bigger the department was formed to support their flower manufacturing intended to maintain the machinery and develop new things to make the operations more efficient they developed this glue that would seal the packages and then this machine that would automatically fill up the bags to the appropriate amounts but then in the 1940s during world war ii they switched their focus to help produce various equipment for the us navy when the war ended they continued working with the government on these hot air balloon projects that's also when they started producing electronics and appliances for consumers there was in existence at one point a general mills toaster and an iron that part actually never did too well it's considered to be one of their few failures so in the early 1960s they sold it then they used that money to get involved in other businesses in the 1960s they made 37 acquisitions most of which were for companies that you would not expect throughout the 1970s and early 80s believe it or not general mills was one of america's largest toy makers they did it almost entirely through these acquisitions essentially skipping from one industry to another in 1965 they bought rainbow crafts which is not a well-known name but it was significant because they were the makers of play-doh two years later they bought kenner products which is another name that you may not know but they were famous for their spirograph and the easy bake oven i mean this is just the stars aligning here we have a product that crosses over between toys and food and they use that opportunity to rebrand it as the betty crocker easy bake oven and betty crocker is another brand that they own i'll get to it in a minute still with the toys and games in 1968 the following year they bought parker brothers which among other things gave them the rights to possibly the most famous board game of all time monopoly also not long after the acquisition parker brothers created the nerf ball so anytime you see a nerf product just know that that was originated under the ownership of general mills there's more in 1970 they bought the licensing rights to make and sell lionel trains it keeps going up but the point here is that they were determined to become a big name in toys which they did to a point where it became a third of their entire business then in 1985 they wanted to get back to basics focus more on their food so they put all of this stuff together and spun it off into its own separate company called kenner parker toys for the next one we have to go back a minute happening almost concurrently with their sudden burst into toys was their sudden burst into fashion i know general mills and fashion are not typically associated but they became a big part of that industry it started in 1968 when they bought mono craft products who were the makers of monet jewelry the next year they bought david crystal the makers of lacoste clothing two years later they bought eddie bauer and then it was talbots and then foot joy i don't know what to say about this one but they were once the owner of all of these major fashion brands that we still see today but remember by 1985 they were getting back to basics back to the foods so they started selling off all of it and by 1988 they had successfully divested completely from the fashion industry all right we're gonna have to go back again because this was when they were really divesting it was into toys into fashion and into restaurants general mills at the same time once owned two of the largest restaurant chains in the united states in 1970 when there was only three of them general mills bought red lobster at this point i'm sure nothing that they do surprises you but it was likely a response to their longtime rival pillsbury who had just bought the fast food chain burger king three years earlier and they did make various attempts at opening other restaurants the following years but the one that stuck was the olive garden now remember in 1985 they were looking to refocus back on food but this was food so they held on to them through the shift and all the way until 1995 that is when the two national chains along with a few other smaller ones were spun off into their own company at that time they had 715 red lobsters and 477 olive gardens i think we can say general mills is the reason that these restaurants turned into what they became alright since they kept divesting and narrowing their market until they were left with essentially consumer foods that's the last thing that i want to talk about when you go to the grocery store you may think that general mills products are limited to that cereal aisle well that is not true i would bet that they either currently own or have once owned something in just about every section i'll talk about some of the more notable ones betty crocker i mentioned this before with the easy bake ovens this is a major food brand owned by general mills based around a fictional character that was created by general mills it's too easy to get sidetracked with this one but the company created her as a means to respond to people's questions about their products you know you'd write in with a question and when they wrote back it would be in her voice she functioned very well as an advertising mascot through radio shows commercials in the 1940s they introduced her cake mix that you could still buy today they used their branding on other products and it became an effective way to sell their stuff in 1931 i want to mention they came out with bisquick moving ahead a bit in the 1960s when they were going crazy with all these acquisitions they were also getting big into snack foods they were buying all these chip companies they bought a nut company they bought gorton's you know the frozen fish company with the gordon's fishermen they bought it in 1968 sold it in 1995 very similar to what happened with red lobster there's just so many here in 1971 they started hamburger helper and then tuna helper and whatever other kinds of helpers there are 1975 they introduced nature valley in 1977 they bought the us rights to the yogurt brand yoplait from a french company today they owned the majority of it in 1985 they started the brand pop secret for microwave popcorn which was later sold in 2008 for 190 million dollars in 1997 after an extended history of dozens of acquisitions they made one larger than any of those when they bought ralcorp holdings for 570 million dollars it gave them the ownership of cookie crisp chex cereal chex mix along with some other brands but that's going to look like nothing compared to what happened in 2000 are you ready for this that year general mills actually bought pillsbury remember the big pillsbury rivalry well i think it officially ended here because they came together in the end it was valued at something like 10 billion dollars which included the assumption of 4.5 billion dollars in debt i made a different video that talks about pillsbury over the years and if you watch that one and see it from the other side i think you'll better understand the significance of this the deal gave general mills control of many of the pillsbury branded products in addition to all these other brands that they had accumulated including green giant vegetables and progreso soup just to bring all of this together i want to conclude with a list of some of the major brands that general mills has been involved with here we go i'm going to try to do it in one breath gold medal flower wcco radio station play-doh spirograph easy bake oven monopoly nerf final trains monet jewelry lacoste clothing eddie bauer talbots footjoy red lobster olive garden betty crocker bisquick gorton's hamburger helper nature valley you'll play pop secret pillsbury green giant progresso and that is nowhere near a complete list just the ones that are more significant or that stand out to me and that list did not include any cereal brands i just talked about general mills for all of this time without even mentioning lucky charms except for their let me know in the comments did i honor my guarantee were you really surprised by something in this video if not all of it if so which part was the most unexpected i also want to say that this is not even everything they've been involved in furniture they had a chemical unit pet food ice cream fruit snacks it's too much i tried to stick to the bigger more shocking ones but there are more annie's homegrown is another one all right i'll stop finally i don't want to discount the breakfast cereals that's been a huge part of their business they've created some of the most popular brands with the most well-known mascots so let me know if you'd like to see another video focusing on that end of things but until then any thoughts about general mills and the wide variety of things that i talked about today leave them in the comments i'd like to hear what you have to say thank you for watching [Music]

Channel: Company Man

Views: 322,562

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Id: HpR2nFmLRh8

Length: 12min 19sec (739 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 31 2021