[earlyriser]

8 months later sounds too short to have taken your idea, I'm guessing launching a product at Mars scale takes like 2 years. This is probably why the always say they cannot take ideas sent by external people... but on the other hand if this came from the CEO, probably could be fast tracked. So 80/20. Do you remember who was the CEO?

[dhosek]

Only vaguely related, but the Mars family lived in neighboring River Forest and the factory was just north of me in Galewood (it is shutting down or already shut down and the property is planned for redevelopment, but the neighboring Metra station is named “Mars” which means that in Chicago you can take a commuter train to Mars). Sadly the Mars estate was apparently torn down to be replaced with a pair of bland McMansions.

[hinkley]

That’s a shame. Annhueser Busch turned one of their estates into a tourist trap. But you couldn’t pet the horses, which is literally the only reason an 11 year old would want to go near a brewery.

[IAmBroom]

Silly person, Mars is a city in PA, not a train station in Chi-town.

The Moon is located just east of the Pittsburgh Airport.

[1980phipsi]

It's packaging an existing product differently than a fully new product. Would still require either new machines or adapting existing machines for it.