Famous Amos: The Rise and Fall of a Cookie Empire

Amos struggled to keep up with the brand’s rapid growth. By 1985, Famous Amos reported a $300,000 loss on sales of $10 million. “He wasn’t a businessman. He was an amazing marketer and had great promotional instincts. But he made a lot of bad decisions,” his son says.

Amos continued to raise money while diluting his own equity. At one point, he lost his home. In 1985, Amos sold a majority stake to Bass Brothers Enterprises for $1.1 million. “He sold it to save it,” Shawn says. “He’s always been impulsive. A lot of entrepreneurs are. That same spark that can drive you to take a chance prevents you from listening to others. You think you’re infallible.”

Two sales later, the new owners added shelf-stable ingredients and repositioned the cookies as an affordable brand, prompting its famous founder to depart. In 1992, President Baking Company bought Famous Amos for $61 million—more than 55 times what Wally Amos sold his controlling stake for just a few years earlier.

That year, Wally Amos launched Wally Amos Presents hazelnut cookies. He was promptly sued for trademark infringement and forbidden from using his own name and likeness. He recalled: “I was stupid, plain and simple. I sold the company and didn’t realize I had sold my future along with it.” Undeterred, he changed the brand’s name to Uncle Nonamé. It filed for bankruptcy in 1996.

In 1999, Amos signed a deal with the new owner of Famous Amos, Keebler, to act as spokesperson. He said yes on the condition that they craft the recipe closer to the original. “It was bittersweet,” says his son. “He was happy to be back in the center of the brand he started, but he also had a hard time accepting the fact that at the end of the day, he was just a paid spokesperson.”

Amos soon left again—this time for good. He pivoted to muffins with Uncle Wally’s Muffin Co. and opened a bake shop in Hawai’i. Amos wrote multiple books about his experiences, including Man With No Name: Turn Lemons into Lemonade, The Famous Amos Story: The Face That Launched 1,000 Chips and The Power In You. A tireless advocate for literacy, he was granted a National Literacy Honors Award by President George H.W. Bush. “As a high school dropout, education was a big deal to him,” Shawn says.

Ever the entrepreneur, Amos appeared on “Shark Tank” at age 80 pitching “The Cookie Kahuna,” a business that eventually failed. In 2017, he launched a GoFundMe announcing he was struggling to pay for food, gas and rent. In 2024, he died at age 88 in Hawaii. Yet his legacy as a barrier-breaking entrepreneur remains.