The Tragic End of Polaroid: The $3 Billion Camera Giant That Destroyed Itself

There is a rule printed on every pack of Polaroid film ever sold. Do not shake the picture. Everybody shook it. The company that made that film sold six million cameras in 1977 and threw a $100,000 party. Its founder held 535 patents, second only to Edison, and was pushed out of his own building four years later for inventing one thing too many. In 1988 the board borrowed $1.1 billion to refuse a buyer. In 1991 it received the largest patent award in American history, $925 million, and most of it went to pay for having said no. On October 11, 2001, Polaroid filed for bankruptcy. Retirees received a check for $47. Forty-five executives received bonuses for staying. The name is on a camera again. It is made in the Netherlands by the people who bought the last machines on the last day the factory was open. People still shake the picture. *Sources* Boston Globe archive on the history of Polaroid and Edwin Land, including the Polavision write-off and the $47 retirement checks FundingUniverse and International Directory of Company Histories on the 1988 Shamrock bid, the ESOP and the $1.1 billion buyback Federal court records and press reporting on Polaroid v. Kodak, 1976–1991 Wikipedia on peak employment, peak revenue and the 2001 and 2008 bankruptcies Polaroid and Impossible Project on the 2008 purchase of the Enschede plant and the 2017 acquisition of the brand