- Trump Airlines: In October 1988, Donald Trump threw his wallet into the airline business by purchasing Eastern Air Shuttle, a service that for 27 years had run hourly flights between Boston, New York City and Washington, D.C. For roughly $365 million, Trump got a fleet of 17 Boeing 727s, landing facilities in each of the three cities and the right to paint his name on an airplane. Trump pushed to give the airline the Trump touch, making the previously no-muss, no-fuss shuttle service into a luxury experience.....The high debt forced Trump to default on his loans, and ownership of the company was turned over to creditors. The Trump Shuttle ceased to exist in 1992
- Trump Vodka Under the slogan "Success Distilled," the liquor was touted as the "epitome of vodka" that would "demand the same respect and inspire the same awe as the international legacy and brand of Donald Trump himself." At the time, Trump predicted the T&T (Trump and Tonic) would become the most requested drink in America, surpassed only by the Trump Martini.Six years later, Grey Goose is still on top shelves throughout the country......As for Trump vodka? Yeah, we'd never heard of it either. The New York City blog Gothamist reports the vodka has stopped production "because the company failed to meet the threshold requirements
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The Bankruptcies "I don't like the B word," Donald Trump said in 2010 while testifying in a New Jersey bankruptcy courtroom about his gambling company, Trump Entertainment Resorts Inc., which had filed for bankruptcy for the third time. Given the number of times Trump has flirted with bankruptcy, you'd think he'd be used to that word by now.
In 1990, the banking institutions that backed his real estate investments had to bail him out with a $65 million "rescue package" that contained new loans and credit. But it wasn't enough, and nine months later the famous developer was nearly $4 billion in debt. He didn't declare personal bankruptcy, although his famous Taj Mahal casino in Atlantic City, N.J., did have to file for it (bondholders ended up taking a 50% stake in the investment). Trump's economic troubles continued through the early '90s, while he was personally leveraged to nearly $1 billion. In 2004, Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts also filed for bankruptcy. The company was only a small portion of Trump's real estate empire, but he did still have to personally cough up $72 million to keep it afloat. In 2009, the same company (by then renamed Trump Entertainment Resorts Inc.) filed for bankruptcy again. An interesting side note: Trump knew nothing about casino's when he went into the business and actually bought competing casino's in Atlantic City- and they undercut each other's business - Trump Mortgage- "Who knows more about financing than me?" Apparently, plenty. Within a year and a half, Trump Mortgage had closed shop. .... The executive Trump selected to run his loan company, E.J. Ridings, claimed to have been a top executive at a prestigious investment bank. In reality, Ridings' highest role on Wall Street was as a registered broker, a position he held for a mere six days
- Trump magazine
Trump launched his eponymous magazine in late 2007, reinventing a publication that had previously been called Trump Style and Trump World. His idea was to "[cash] in on the booming advertising market for yachts and other high-end commodities." The timing, of course, couldn't have been worse for a magazine, particularly one dependent on luxury advertising. It didn't survive the financial crisis, folding by 2009. - Trump Tower Tampa
The 52-story Trump Tower in Tampa wasn't conceived of or proposed or drafted up by Donald Trump — he just sold the use of his name to developers of the $300 million condo project for a cool $2 million. They, in turn, collected downpayments from individual buyers drawn in by the Trump mystique. After the project went belly-up in 2008 (it listed two scale models and some office furniture, worth a grand total of $3,500, as its only assets in bankruptcy court) buyers sued Trump for misleading them. He eventually settled, in some cases for as little as $11,115, with plaintiffs who had lost hundreds of thousands of dollars. - Stiffing his business Partners Huge corporate failures are the stuff of headlines, but Trump’s mistakes in business have included plenty of small deals as well. In 2008, he defaulted on a $640 million construction loan for Trump International Hotel & Tower in Chicago, and the primary lender, Deutsche Bank, sued him. Trump countersued, howling that the bank had damaged his reputation. In a snarky court reply, Deutsche Bank said, “Trump is no stranger to overdue debt.” (The suit was ultimately resolved, with Deutsche Bank extending the terms of the loan; another lender, Fortress Investment Group, had to suck up losses from its foray into Trump’s Chicago project.)
- Leasing his Name- to bring in suckers- and stiffing the little people=-
Around the country, buyers were led to believe they were purchasing apartments in buildings overseen by Trump, although his only involvement in many cases was getting paid for the use of his brand. For example, in 2009, Trump and a developer named Jorge Pérez unveiled plans for Trump Hollywood, a 40-story oceanfront condominium that they boasted would sell at premium prices and feature such luxuries as Italian cabinetry. But with the entire real estate market imploding, condo buyers were looking for bargains, and sales were minuscule. In 2010, lenders foreclosed on the $355 million project. Even though Trump’s name was listed on the condominium’s website as the developer, he immediately distanced himself from the project, saying he had only licensed his name.
A similarly sordid tale unfolded for Trump Ocean Resort Baja Mexico, a 525-unit luxury vacation home complex that Trump proclaimed was going to be “very, very special.” His name and image were all over the property, and he even personally appeared in the marketing video discussing how investors would be “following” him if they bought into the building. Scores of buyers ponied up deposits in 2006, but by 2009 the project was still just a hole in the ground. That year, the developers notified condo buyers their $32 million in deposits had been spent, no bank financing could be obtained, and they were walking away from the project. Scores of lawsuits claimed the buyers were deceived into believing Trump was the developer. Trump walked away from the deal, saying that if the condo buyers had any questions, they needed to contact the developer—and that wasn’t him, contrary to what the marketing material implied.
The same story has played out again and again. In Fort Lauderdale, Florida, people who thought they were buying into a Trump property lost their deposits of at least $100,000, with Trump saying it was not his responsibility because he had only licensed his name.
Investors in another failed Floridian property, Trump Tower Tampa, put up millions in the project in 2005 believing the building was being constructed by him. Instead, they discovered it was all a sham in 2007, inadvertently from Trump, when he sued the builder for failing to pay his license fees. The investors lost their money, and finally got to hear Trump respond to allegations that he had defrauded them when they sued him. In a deposition, lawyers for the Tampa buyers asked him if he would be responsible for any shoddy construction; Trump responded that he had “no liability” because it was only a name-licensing deal. As for the investors, some of whom surrendered their life savings for what they thought was a chance to live in a Trump property, Trump said they at least dodged the collapse of the real estate market by not buying the apartments earlier.
“They were better off losing their deposit,” he said. - Trump Steaks- Rolling Stone also points out this gem: Trump Steaks. After declaring bankruptcy on properties in Atlantic City, Trump apparently figured his next best move was to invest in Buckhead Beef. In 2007, he teamed up with then-Sharper Image CEO Jerry Levin to try and sell meat to the masses. “It was a bad business idea,” Levin admitted to ThinkProgress in March 2016. "[W]e literally sold almost no steaks. If we sold $50,000 of steaks grand total, I'd be surprised."
- Finally and of course- Trump University- According to Yahoo! Finance, Trump University was both for-profit and non-accredited. The 'university' closed down not long after four students sued, saying the classes were little more than infomercials. Despite a name change, the whole idea was done by 2011- currently the subject of three lawsuits claiming that Trump had made fraudulant claims
- Trump repeatedly promised his ventures would be HUGE- without any reason to believe that.
- Trump always blames the failures on someone else
- Trump has left lots and lots of people holding the bag for his mistakes in leadership
