10 years ago, the Nasdaq hit its all-time high. Here are some of the biggest dot.com busts.

1. Pets.com

The Pets.com sock puppet has become synonymous with the dot.com bust. The company lost $147 million in the first nine months of 2000, and the company was unable to secure more cash from investors. When Pets.com went public in February 2000, its stock started at $11 a share and rose to a high of $14. But the rally was shortlived and Pets.com’s stock quickly fell below $1 and stayed there until its demise.

2. Webvan.com

Like many victims of the bubble, the grocery delivery service grew too fast, expanding its services to eight cities in just a year and a half. In the summer of 1999, Webvan announced it was making a $1 billion investment in warehouses and would expand to 26 more cities by 2001.

At its November 1999 IPO, Webvan raised $375 million, shares traded at around $30 and the company was valued at $1.2 billion. But that was its peak. By the time the company announced it would close up shop in July 2001, Webvan’s stock fell to just 6 cents a share. Webvan laid off 2,000 employees when it failed.

3. eToys.com

When eToys.com shares hit a high of $84.35 in October 1999, who could have guessed that just 16 months later, the company would warn investors that its stock was “worthless?” After reporting a $74.5 million loss in the last quarter of 2000, the company said it had just enough cash to last until March 31, but after that it would require “an additional, substantial capital infusion.” It never found a white knight. Citing debt of $247 million, eToys said in February 2001 it had no alternative but to file for bankruptcy.

4. GeoCities.com

Not all of the dot.com busts disappeared right away. In fact, GeoCities lasted until last October. The Web hosting service gave many Internet users their first Web sites. With 19 million unique visitors per month, GeoCities was the third-most visited site on the Web behind AOL and Yahoo in 1998.

When Yahoo bought GeoCities for $3.6 billion in January 1999, it was widely considered a coup. At the point of sale, Yahoo traded at $368 and GeoCities shares sold at $117. Yahoo closed down GeoCities on Oct. 26. Many believe GeoCities and its millions of users represented a missed oportunity for Yahoo to evolve the service into a more modern social network.

5. theGlobe.com

TheGlobe.com isn’t remembered for becoming one of the first social media sites way back in 1995 as much as it’s remembered for its record-setting initial public offering. When theGlobe.com went public on November 13, 1998, its stock jumped a then-record 600% in its first day of trading. The company set the offer price at $9 a share, but the stock opened at $87. Shares of theGlobe.com rose to a high of $97 during its first day of trading before closing at $63.50.

The company raised $27.9 million in its IPO, and its market cap was valued at $842 million. But less than two years later, in August 2001, theGlobe.com’s stock was delisted by the Nasdaq stock exchange for failing to stay above $1 per share.

6. Go.com

In 1998, Disney set up Go.com to compete with the likes of Yahoo and AOL. Go.com grew out of a merger of Disney’s online properties like ABC.com and ESPN.com with the search engine Infoseek. In November 1999, Disney even created a tracking stock for Go.com, a separate class of stock that reflected the performance of the new Web property.

But Go.com never really got going, unable to grow its user base by more than 21 million visitors per month — less than half of AOL and Yahoo in 2000 and 2001. One likely reason for its lack of success: Being owned by Disney, Go.com restricted adult material.In January 2001, Disney announced it would shut down Go.com, and the company took a write-off of $790 million. Disney never actually shut down the site, which is now just used as a hosting site for ESPN.com and ABC.com.

7. Flooz.com

Flooz.com sold online currency that could be used instead of credit cards. After users bought enough Flooz, they could spend it at participating online stores like Tower Records, Barnes & Noble, Outpost.com and Restoration Hardware. Despite the stupidity of its concept, Flooz.com raised $35 million from investors. Corporate partners Cisco and Delta Air Lines used Flooz for corporate gifts.

And despite spending $8 million on an ad campaign featuring Whoopi Goldberg, Flooz went bankrupt in August 2001, less than two years after it opened its virtual doors.

8. theGlobe.com

Founded by 20 year-old Cornell students Todd Krizelman and Stephan Paternot, theGlobe.com was revolutionary for its day. The site allowed users to create and post their own Web pages.

The company stopped its Web hosting business in 2001 but its online gaming sites stayed popular. TheGlobe.com was ultimately unable to sustain itself, and the company finally closed up shop for good in March 2007.

9. drKoop.com

Before there was WebMd, there was drkoop.com.

The health information Web site co-founded in 1998 by Reagan administration Surgeon General Dr. C. Everett Koop made a splash when it raked in $88.5 million in its June 1999 initial public offering. The site was quickly ranked the No. 1 health care content site on the Internet, with an average of about 1.4 million unique visitors per month in 1999.

10. Kozmo.com

The delivery service would allow urban customers to order a wide array of products, including CDs, DVDs, electronics and snacks. Deliverymen would then come and deliver the order to customers’ doors for free within one hour. Kozmo.com, which was available in nine cities, was once seen as a new method of delivery for online purchases that would eventually challenge UPS and FedEx. Kozmo secured about $280 million from investors, including $60 million from Amazon.com. and a $150 million promotion deal with Starbucks.

But free delivery and no minimum purchase became the company’s undoing. Kozmo.com had to withdraw plans for an initial public offering in the summer of 2000, citing unfavorable market conditions and losses of $26 million in 1999. The company laid off 900 of its 2,000-person workforce and instituted a $10 minimum charge in the first quarter of 2001, but it was forced to shut down its service in April 2001.

11. Garden.com

It took just 14 months for the dot.com bust to kill off gardening products retailer Garden.com.

The company’s stock climbed above $20 in September 1999, just days after its initial public offer. But a year later, Garden.com announced it would cut 40% of its workforce, after the company lost $9.9 million in the third quarter of 2000.

Filed under: Affiliate Marketing

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