CDZ Would you consider Donald Trump a good businessman?

[nicoleivy5]

Complete list of Donald Trump's failed businesses (he failed more than 10 businesses)

He had a really rich father, and most of the businesses he started failed. So is he really a good businessman? What are his most successful enterprises? and worse?
I think worse has to be Trump University because his failure was bad for the students who invested tens of thousands on his seminars

 

[320 Years of History]

"Would you consider Donald Trump a good businessman?"

I consider him good enough to make the "law of big numbers" work for himself in a way that allows him to be quite wealthy. The thing is that it's hard to say that he's an unusually good businessman because he started out with more than "a leg up" in the game of "let's see who 'makes it.l'" It's even harder to say when one considers just how many businesses of his have failed.

I don't begrudge him that. I'm just saying that had my father given or loaned me $1M in 1968 (~7M in today's money), by simply not screwing up too much -- and Trump's screwed up more than most folks get the chance to -- I would easily be on Fortune's list of the 400 wealthiest Americans. I don't know where I'd be on that list, but I'd be there. So would you. So would just about anyone. Inheriting later ~$200M certainly didn't hurt.

Do I think him particularly innovative like Elon Musk or someone else who's invented something new? No. Do I think him a better businessman than some of his competitors such as Sheldon Adelson? Not remotely. Steve Wynn who seems to have fewer companies and fewer hotels/rental properties has managed to roughly match Trump's wealth position. On top of that, how, pray tell, does a huge casino owner go belly up? Given the cash flows those businesses generate, about the only way that happens, much as it is in banking, automobile manufacturing and airlines, is one's poorly managing the business. Yes, other casinos have gone bankrupt, but failing casinos are very rare. (Compare that with the number of restaurants or retailers that have gone out of business.)

So, no, I don't think Trump is a good businessman, in the sense of being a better businessman than other "big dollar" CEOs, as much as I think he's good enough to keep his businesses going. Do I think he would do well as the CEO of a publicly traded company? No, not at all. I think he has neither the temperament nor the ingenuity nor the breadth of skills to do that.

What I think Trump is excellent at is marketing, and that's a fine thing to be very good at. Moreover, when thinking about great CEOs, yes, being a very good marketer often has been the calling card of many of them. What distinguishes a "good enough" businessman from a "good" one or "excellent" one is at how many things the person is adept.

There's no sin in being really good at one thing; that's more than enough things to achieve great success. So, don't think I'm berating Trump in that regard. I'm not. I'm just giving him his due, but not more than his due.

 

[Andylusion]

Complete list of Donald Trump's failed businesses (he failed more than 10 businesses)

He had a really rich father, and most of the businesses he started failed. So is he really a good businessman? What are his most successful enterprises? and worse?
I think worse has to be Trump University because his failure was bad for the students who invested tens of thousands on his seminars

First off, having a business fail... is part of doing business. In fact, having failures is part of being successful at anything.

Oprah was flat out fired from her first TV job.
So-Cal School of Cinematic Arts rejected Steven Spielberg TWICE.
Walt Disney was told by his newspaper editor, that he "lacked imagination and had no good ideas"
The first time Jerry Seinfeld got up on stage, he froze... total blank, and was boo'd off the stage.
Stephen King had his first book, rejected by every publisher, with over 30 rejections. It was actually his wife which literally retried the book thrown in the trash, and convinced him to keep trying.
Michael Jordan was famously cut from his high school basket ball team.

The same is true in business.

Henry Ford, founded two car companies, both of which went bankrupt and left him broke before he founded Ford.
Rowland Hussey Macy founded FOUR dry-goods stores that all failed one after the other, before starting Macys.
Richard Branson started his life with a magazine called Student, which folded quickly. But to replace that, he created Virgin Records. Along with his other success Virgin Airlines, he's tried business in clothing, drinks, social networking, video games, car sales, and retail stores, and more. All failed.
Mark Cuban, before he made millions selling his business to Yahoo, failed at a carpentry company, waiter, bartender, disco dancing, and was fired for not opening his PC retail store in the morning.

Jeff Bezos of Amazon fame, says this:

He says nine times out of ten, you're going to fail. But every once in while, you'll hit a home run that in business terms is more like 1,000 runs. "Given a ten percent chance of a 100 times payoff, you should take that bet every time," Bezos says.

It's why Bezos isn't fazed by the massive failure of the Fire Phone, which cost the company hundreds of millions of dollars. "If you think that's a big failure, we're working on much bigger failures right now. And I am not kidding. And some of them are going to make the Fire Phone look like a tiny little blip," he says.​

How Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has inspired people to change the way they think about failure

Failure is a fact of life, when you try. The more you try, the more you are going to fail.

But each try has a chance of success, and that is how people succeed. I could continue with an endless list of major successes who started as failures. Heinz Ketchup, started out as a company selling horse radish which went bankrupt. Hershey chocolate, started out as a 3 or 4 candy companies that all failed.

Trump has dozens of business failures, because he has started dozens of businesses. That fact he has failed dozens of times, and still is a wealthy business owner, is simply proof he's a good entrepreneur.

"most of the businesses he started failed"

This is entirely false.

The Trump Organization is the collective name of approximately 500 business entities of which Donald Trump is the sole or principal owner.

Your list is:
Trump steaks
gotrump.com
Trump airlines
Trump Vodka
Trump mortgage
Trump University
Trump: The Game
Trump Magazine
Trump Ice

That is actually pretty accurate. About 10 major failures, verses 500 different businesses still operating profitable.

Grand Hyatt Hotel
Trump Tower
Wollman Rink
40 Wall Street
Trump Place
The Apprentice
Trump International Tower Chicago
Trump Model Management

And those of course, are just the biggest successes. Others would include his book "The Art of the Deal" which was 52 weeks on the best seller list, and a TV production company, as well as a private jet firm. This excludes numerous hotels, golf courses, and other businesses.

By the way, the TV show Apprentice, is not just a Donald Trump invention, but he actually owns the production company that created and produced that show, and several others you may not know.

Now when you say Trump had a wealthy father, that's true. What you may not know is that by every measurement we have, Trump inherited roughly $300 Million in property and investments from his father.

However, Trumps net worth today is about $3.5 Billion. There is no question Trump didn't grow up poor. But there is also no question that Trump is a business success. He did not inherit the wealth he has. He earned it.

You may not like him. You may not care for his policies and views. But you can't make the claim he isn't a business success.

 

[Andylusion]

"Would you consider Donald Trump a good businessman?"

I consider him good enough to make the "law of big numbers" work for himself in a way that allows him to be quite wealthy. The thing is that it's hard to say that he's an unusually good businessman because he started out with more than "a leg up" in the game of "let's see who 'makes it.l'" It's even harder to say when one considers just how many businesses of his have failed.

I don't begrudge him that. I'm just saying that had my father given or loaned me $1M in 1968 (~7M in today's money), by simply not screwing up too much -- and Trump's screwed up more than most folks get the chance to -- I would easily be on Fortune's list of the 400 wealthiest Americans. I don't know where I'd be on that list, but I'd be there. So would you. So would just about anyone. Inheriting later ~$200M certainly didn't hurt.

Do I think him particularly innovative like Elon Musk or someone else who's invented something new? No. Do I think him a better businessman than some of his competitors such as Sheldon Adelson? Not remotely. Steve Wynn who seems to have fewer companies and fewer hotels/rental properties has managed to roughly match Trump's wealth position. On top of that, how, pray tell, does a huge casino owner go belly up? Given the cash flows those businesses generate, about the only way that happens, much as it is in banking, automobile manufacturing and airlines, is one's poorly managing the business. Yes, other casinos have gone bankrupt, but failing casinos are very rare. (Compare that with the number of restaurants or retailers that have gone out of business.)

So, no, I don't think Trump is a good businessman, in the sense of being a better businessman than other "big dollar" CEOs, as much as I think he's good enough to keep his businesses going. Do I think he would do well as the CEO of a publicly traded company? No, not at all. I think he has neither the temperament nor the ingenuity nor the breadth of skills to do that.

What I think Trump is excellent at is marketing, and that's a fine thing to be very good at. Moreover, when thinking about great CEOs, yes, being a very good marketer often has been the calling card of many of them. What distinguishes a "good enough" businessman from a "good" one or "excellent" one is at how many things the person is adept.

There's no sin in being really good at one thing; that's more than enough things to achieve great success. So, don't think I'm berating Trump in that regard. I'm not. I'm just giving him his due, but not more than his due.

I would have to disagree with you.

First, there are numerous examples where people were given far more than $7 Million, and ended in bankruptcy. Not just knocked off their feet with a few failed businesses, but absolute zero.

Allen Stanford
Bjorgolfur Gudmundsson
Eike Batista
Sean Quinn
Alberto Vilar

All were not just millionaires, but Billionaires, and went broke with bad deals.

So to claim "if I had that much money given to me, I would succeed too" simply isn't true. I don't care how sure of yourself you are.... getting money alone isn't enough to succeed.

Now beyond that, I'm amazed at this claim people keep batting around that Trump has, as you put it "just how many businesses of his have failed." when the answer is.... not that many. The Trump Organization is a collection of over 500 different businesses. How many business failures can you list?

Not that many! How many? You show me! Does it compare to the 500 different profitable businesses?

And the casinos..... You say casinos rarely fail. Based on what do you make that claim? I happen to look a list of Casino closures in Las Vegas... 14 in the past decade. Not that rare....

As for specifically the Trump Casinos, Trump heavily invested in two Casinos in Atlantic City. Trump Plaza Hotal and Casino, and the Taj Mahal. Trump has owned other Casinos which were very profitable, but were sold off when the subsidiary ran into trouble because of these two, Trump Plaza and the Taj Mahal.

These are two of 5 Casinos that have closed in Atlantic City just in recent years. The problem isn't with the Casinos, but rather with Atlantic City. The amount of gambling revenue is limited, and the city kept opening more and more casinos.

Each new casino split the finite gambling revenue into smaller slices of the pie. Then at the exact same time, the age of internet gambling came into it's own, and while the additional casinos were dividing the revenue pie into smaller slices, the pie itself was starting to shrink. In addition to that, you have the great recession, that many people still see the 'recovery' as being the worst 'recovery' in US history (I would say thanks to terrible regulations and policies of Obama).

These three things combined, resulted in devastation of the Atlantic City casinos. Not just Trump, but everyone that invested heavily into Casinos in Atlantic City.

So, I don't think you really have that much of a case against Trump.

 

[Esmeralda]

"Would you consider Donald Trump a good businessman?"

I don't consider him a good anything. Disgusting human being from start to finish.

 

[yiostheoy]

Any moron who runs up a huge tax deduction NOL is a moron not a businessman.

The Frontline special on Donald and Hillary has already exposed Trump as a business moron.

His bankers however decided he was too big to fail. So they kept him alive.

They should have let it die. Now the GOP risks dying instead.

 

[Andylusion]

Any moron who runs up a huge tax deduction NOL is a moron not a businessman.

The Frontline special on Donald and Hillary has already exposed Trump as a business moron.

His bankers however decided he was too big to fail. So they kept him alive.

They should have let it die. Now the GOP risks dying instead.

Nearly every person in business is apparently a moron and not a businessman, according to your views.

 

[nicoleivy5]

thanks for the post guys.

 

[Bush92]

He is awesome. What business has Hillary been in? Making money off a foundation that had a pay-to-play relationship with the Sec. Of States Office. Hmmmm. Oh and we know that Bill is good at monkey business.

 

[nicoleivy5]

Complete list of Donald Trump's failed businesses (he failed more than 10 businesses)

He had a really rich father, and most of the businesses he started failed. So is he really a good businessman? What are his most successful enterprises? and worse?
I think worse has to be Trump University because his failure was bad for the students who invested tens of thousands on his seminars

everybody fails

 

[GaryDog]

He's a showman, not a businessman. The guy doesn't really understand the first thing about finance, business management, etc. He's proven that repeatedly. What he can do is be bombastic and hog the camera until his name attracts dollars like jupiter attracts moons.

 

[nicoleivy5]

He's a showman, not a businessman. The guy doesn't really understand the first thing about finance, business management, etc. He's proven that repeatedly. What he can do is be bombastic and hog the camera until his name attracts dollars like jupiter attracts moons.

but he ran successful businesses in the past

 

[Andylusion]

He's a showman, not a businessman. The guy doesn't really understand the first thing about finance, business management, etc. He's proven that repeatedly. What he can do is be bombastic and hog the camera until his name attracts dollars like jupiter attracts moons.

Trump has over 500 successful and profitable businesses.

Please explain what your evidence is to support you moronic claim?

 

[grbb]

I think trump is good at deal making and he's going to be a good US president. Not as good as Bill Gates or Elon Musk would be, but definitely far better than that feminazi old hag.

Will he be a good CEO? I'd say he'll be a moderate one.

Not bad. He keep his biz floating. It takes some form of meritocracy and leadership to keep a confessional biz going. And he has many bizs.

IT bizs are different than normal bizs. IT bizs have unsual ideas and high margin if you hit jackpot.

To consistently win in normal biz you need common sense more than ingenuity and Trump have both. Not extreme cases of both. But far more than average both.

 

[grbb]

Any moron who runs up a huge tax deduction NOL is a moron not a businessman.

The Frontline special on Donald and Hillary has already exposed Trump as a business moron.

His bankers however decided he was too big to fail. So they kept him alive.

They should have let it die. Now the GOP risks dying instead.

And how do you persuade the bank to believe that they are better off to help you than letting you fail?

Basically there was a crisis. Trump is one of those affected. He basically told the bank that if they let him continue, his whole biz worth more than his loan.

The bank continues. I bet after some deal where the bank would get extra profit share or something. He continued. And it works.

I can't do that.

Shillary cannot do that.

Trump can. And DID.

Also I would worry a lot about hiring someone who makes money through politic.

Hillarious make money by getting bribe through "speaking fee". That is serious conflict of interests.

 

[Onyx]

I'd consider him a better mafioso or cartel lord to be honest.

 

[Southern Dad]

Complete list of Donald Trump's failed businesses (he failed more than 10 businesses)

He had a really rich father, and most of the businesses he started failed. So is he really a good businessman?

The word that I have a problem with in your post is most. Donald J Trump has built a multi-billion dollar company. He has employed many people. There are many, many projects of his that are finished on time and beating budget. Has he had some that went south? You bet. Abraham Lincoln, Henry Ford, and Walt Disney all filed bankruptcy. People who are willing to take a chance, will have successes, and they will have failures.

Mark Cuban, who detests Donald J Trump said, "Failure is part of the success equation."

 

[grbb]

Complete list of Donald Trump's failed businesses (he failed more than 10 businesses)

He had a really rich father, and most of the businesses he started failed. So is he really a good businessman?

The word that I have a problem with in your post is most. Donald J Trump has built a multi-billion dollar company. He has employed many people. There are many, many projects of his that are finished on time and beating budget. Has he had some that went south? You bet. Abraham Lincoln, Henry Ford, and Walt Disney all filed bankruptcy. People who are willing to take a chance, will have successes, and they will have failures.

Mark Cuban, who detests Donald J Trump said, "Failure is part of the success equation."

I totally agree. US has it's BEST presidential candidate ever. His opponent is the worst ever.

Should have been an easy pick.

 

[GaryDog]

He's a showman, not a businessman. The guy doesn't really understand the first thing about finance, business management, etc. He's proven that repeatedly. What he can do is be bombastic and hog the camera until his name attracts dollars like jupiter attracts moons.

Trump has over 500 successful and profitable businesses.

Please explain what your evidence is to support you moronic claim?

There's no way he's even marginally involved in their success. Investing is not the same as running a business.

 

[GaryDog]

Complete list of Donald Trump's failed businesses (he failed more than 10 businesses)

He had a really rich father, and most of the businesses he started failed. So is he really a good businessman?

The word that I have a problem with in your post is most. Donald J Trump has built a multi-billion dollar company. He has employed many people. There are many, many projects of his that are finished on time and beating budget. Has he had some that went south? You bet. Abraham Lincoln, Henry Ford, and Walt Disney all filed bankruptcy. People who are willing to take a chance, will have successes, and they will have failures.

Mark Cuban, who detests Donald J Trump said, "Failure is part of the success equation."

I totally agree. US has it's BEST presidential candidate ever. His opponent is the worst ever.

Should have been an easy pick.

lol