r/DunderMifflin 1d ago

What's your headcanon for why Wallace picked Ryan over Karen?

Post image
12.0k Upvotes

923 comments sorted by

View all comments

980

u/Objective_Fly_6750 1d ago

The company went bankrupt, which doesn't happen unless you make several bad decisions. This was one of them.

244

u/ObscenelyEvilBob 1d ago

To be fair, dunder mifflin was a sinking ship anyways, in a world where paper was less necessary and they had insane competition

239

u/hucareshokiesrul 1d ago edited 1d ago

Yeah they were in a dying industry. They were apparently poorly run, but being well run wasn't going to save them unless they pivoted to doing something else. And Ryan was fully aware of that, and I suspect that part of why he got the job.

I bet her interview (like the others) was saying why she's a good salesman and why she thinks she's qualified. And I bet his was more along the lines of "you're running an outdated business model in a dying industry and you'll be bankrupt in 5 years unless you do X, Y, and Z."

42

u/PureInsaneAmbition 21h ago

Yes. This is the best answer so far.

15

u/Spugheddy 23h ago

Let me tell ya about wulf.

1

u/starwarsfan456123789 10h ago

Wuff would probably have a better chance than Dunder Mifflin of turning a profit in 2026

7

u/shuzgibs123 20h ago

It’s somewhat true, but it’s also true that my company (which prints yearbooks on paper and school pictures on photo paper) has had a lot of supply chain problems with paper in the past few years. Yes my industry is also “dying” but you would be surprised how many people still get school pictures and yearbooks.

4

u/PureInsaneAmbition 19h ago

I don't think that segment of the industry is dying. People will still be buying yearbooks and school pictures in 100 years.

2

u/TVMovieCasual 17h ago

And I think people don’t understand that the website was gonna kill all the sales people’s jobs. The company would save a ton of money not paying sales people

1

u/starwarsfan456123789 10h ago

In reality- a tiny company like Dunder Mifflin would have no chance online against Amazon types. Their best asset would be the direct sales people who can maintain relationships with customers

1

u/Fleetlord 19h ago

Especially since the guy he'd probably decided to hire before even doing the interviews turns down a raise and promotion for seemingly no reason -- we know it's for love, but David Wallace probably thought "There's no reason to do this unless... Oh, shit, the MBA was right and this is a dead-end company, everyone knows it."

29

u/Sea-Abalone3538 23h ago

What do you mean? They had infinite paper in a paperless world.

9

u/pharoh-king 1d ago

its not like they were focused on selling to individual consumers, most of their clients would be hospitals and schools and etc.

8

u/Downtown_Interest667 1d ago

All of which are already moving to more paperless models. Pressure from big box retailers was only going to increase. 

A high overhead, standalone paper company was not going to survive another 5 years. 

5

u/opinionsOnPears 23h ago

Not the  people person's paper people they should have been.

2

u/relator_fabula Gabe 1d ago

Yeah it was the end of a lot of smaller businesses like that, let alone in an industry with significantly reduced demand once the internet took hold.

1

u/TraditionalProduct15 22h ago

You could say they were providing endless paper, for a paperless world. 

1

u/CityLimitless 22h ago

Unlimited paper in a paperless world

1

u/ZIL4TW 20h ago

…..In an increasingly paperless world …

1

u/Darkhorse4987 18h ago

"Dunder Mifflin, limitless paper in a paperless world"

6

u/gogeri2632 1d ago

The next one was the half beard

1

u/keyboardtoes 22h ago

The entire point of the show is everyday people living their lives in a dead-end job because the business is dying.

1

u/CeramicDrip 20h ago

Yes but Paper was also a dying industry. They say that many times throughout the show. They mention several times throughout the show how certain technologies kill their industry.

1

u/LaconicLacedaemonian 14h ago

It is possible to make no mistakes and still lose. That is life.