As Collins and his team compiled the list of good-to-great companies, they needed to contextualize their research by using apt comparisons. According to Collins, these direct comparisons “were in the same industry as the good-to-great companies with the same opportunities and similar resources at the time of transition, but [...] showed no leap from good to great” (8). Some of the most notable examples include the comparison between Wells Fargo (good-to-great) and Bank of America (direct comparison), Fannie Mae (good-to-great) and Great Western (direct comparison), and Kroger (good-to-great) and A & P (direct comparison). Without researching the performance of these direct comparison companies, Collins and his team would have been limited in their ability to draw conclusions about what made the good-to-great companies’ accomplishments so spectacular.

Here are the 11 direct comparison companies Collins cites as having met his search team’s criteria: Upjohn, Silo, Great Western, Warner-Lambert, Scott Paper, A&P, Bethlehem Steel, R.J. Reynolds, Addressograph, Eckerd, and Bank of America.

In companies that were not able to sustain the good-to-great transition, Collins and his research team identified a pattern they called the “doom loop.” These companies became trapped in a vicious cycle characterized by the four following steps: disappointing results; reaction without understanding; new direction, program, leader, event, fad, or acquisition; no build-up and thus no accelerated momentum.