With temperance pressures rising, Adolph Coors knew diversification was crucial to his industry. In 1910, he invested in John J. Herold's pottery works at 8th and Ford Streets. During the middle of the decade, embargoes on German import porcelain created a market for high quality chemical porcelains and consumer products.
Production of the home-use pieces ceased in 1941 when Coors Porcelain reinvented itself as part of the American war effort. The company provided porcelain housings for land mines and insulators. Also, according to the Colorado Transcript, the plant had an important role in producing the atomic bomb. Coors Porcelain supplied materials used in production of the first atomic bombs. Coors continues to this day producing chemical porcelain for industrial use.
In addition to diversifying into porcelain, Adolph Coors was determined that the brewery operation would not close during prohibition. Putting his son, Grover, in charge of the new near-beer and malted milk enterprises, Adolph Coors diversified the brewing operation itself.
The near-beer was never a resounding success. When Adolph Sr. tasted the brew he is said to have remarked, "It looks like beer, and it smells like beer, but it tastes like?"
Malted milk proved to be more of a commercial success for the company. The product was sold in various forms from powders to tablets to syrup. At a time when Coors most needed economic support, Mars Candy Company ordered as much malted milk as Coors could produce. Coors malted milk was an essential component in many of Mars' popular products through 1957.
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