Publications

- September 2008: Vol. 20 No. 9

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The Name Game

by Larry Gray

It is a familiar story:

When launching a new company, one of the first orders of business is coming up with a firm name. In a competitive marketplace, more companies are realizing the importance of establishing a recognizable, memorable name. In fact, during the past few decades, naming has become a big business in itself, with specialist firms charging clients $50,000 and much more to develop a company or product name.

In a very insightful and funny article on the naming industry that appeared in Salon magazine (www.salon.com/media/col/shal/1999/11/30/naming/print.html), one naming industry executive was quoted, “A typical naming process costs about $75,000. Now that might sound like a lot of money. But naming is very difficult and challenging. There are rules to follow. Rules of linguistics. Rules of trademark. Rules of international corporate nomenclature. It’s not just a process of pizza and beer around the table.”

Try telling that to company

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