Switch to any 24 hour shopping channel and there is a strong chance that you will see a famous face pleading with you to buy something. It may surprise you that most products that are endorsed by a celebrity, no matter how enthusiastically that celebrity talks about that particular juicer or exercise bike, they had nothing to do with its design or conception. The same goes for the George Foreman Grill. For those of you who bought the grill because you thought the former heavyweight boxer designed it, I've got some bad news for you. And the grill is also bad news for Hogan. According to the Hulkster, he was offered the gig of endorsing the grill in 1994 but missed the phone call because he was picking up the kids. Hogan said:
"George Foreman and I had the same agent. I went to pick my children up early from schoolwhen I came home I checked my answering machine and my agent said 'hey, Hogan, I've got a grill and I've got a blender, which one do you want to pick? I'll call George and ask him since you're not home.' So when I got home I said what's up with the grill and the blender and he said 'George picked the grill because you weren't home' so $400 million later we've got the Foreman Grilland I've got the Thunder MixerGeorge has joked about it on several occasions and I would knock him out if I could.
O there is this story which he told Sam Worthington at San Diego Comic-Con. According to the Avatar actor, Hogan gave him investment advice and told him about the mistake he made with the grill. Worthington said:
The Hulk said, Well, what have you got? The manager said, Well, Ive got this meatball maker It pounds the meatballs when you (clench arm muscles and press fists together). The Hulk went, Thats fantastic, I want the Hulkamania Meatball Maker! The manager goes, What about the other thing (investment opportunity)? He goes, Ah, give that to your other client. The other client turned out to be George Foreman, it was the grill! So George Foremans made $300 billion and how many people own a Hulkamania Meatball Maker?
Whichever story is true, choosing the meatball maker over the grill was a massive Hulkamania mistake. George Foreman has made $150 million from the clam shaped grill, that's more than he ever made from his boxing career. Hogan did launch Hulk Hogan's Ultimate Grill many years later but do you know anyone who has one of those? http://youtu.be/8yli4iC-q2A?t=5s
