Brands, well some of them are seriously thought of and at times it takes months to arrive at the decision to name one´s product or service. Other times, these are just accidental. Let´s have a look at some of the major brands and how they came into being.
Burda Magazine
As the story goes, once upon a time there was a couple and the husband was cheating on his wife with a woman who owned a printing facility. Once discovered, the wife got the printing facility in settlement. It remained a mediocre business until the wife came up with the idea of Burda magazine that would contain patterns of attractive dresses and instructions on making the dresses. Today, this is a much sought after magazine.
FCUK
This clothing company was just another middling organization with the name French Connection U.K. Limited until someone while drafting an email formed the acronym for want of time. This caught the attention of a senior manager who worked towards establishing it as a brand. The brand appealed very much to the young because of the rebellious connotation. The rest is history.
Starbucks
Synonymous with coffee today, the founders picked up the name of a Moby Dick character, Starbuck. Today when one thinks of a quick coffee, one often thinks Starbucks.
Pepsi
Far from the popular cola it is today, Pepsi as a name was based on the digestive enzyme, Pepsin and was a health drink. Looks like the health drink did not work but the cola did and did superbly enough to become a serious competitor to Coca Cola.
Yahoo
The dictionary defines the word as an ‘an uncultivated or boorish person; lout; philistine, yokel. However, The term for the search engine came from the acronym of “Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle.” Incidentally, One of the meanings of Oracle is connected to the word ‘wisdom’.
A misspelling and it happened. As one understands, the founders originally wanted to name the search engine Googol which means the number 1 followed by one hundred zeros. An accident and here we have Google.
Adidas
Some say it comes from ‘All Day I Dream About Soccer’. The truth is it comes from the name of the founder, Adolf Dassler who was otherwise called Adi.
It is said the company had originally considered the word Twitch and later decided to call it Twitter which means, a short burst of inconsequential information or chirps from birds. Today, presidents are using it in place of bilateral meetings and diplomacy.
Apple
Apparently, Steve Jobs wanted to distance himself from technical jargon when he named his computer. It was also his favourite fruit and may also be remotely related to his working at an apple orchard.
Photos: Shutterstock
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