#19484 - 02/19/01 04:23 AM
Re: Mangled English for Corporate Identity
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 11/13/00
Posts: 3146
Loc: Northamptonshire, England
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QANTAS - flew with them last week. They bought out Ansett NZ a few months ago. I won't spoil your fun about what the name means, but tell me this:
How do you pronounce it? I mean, QUANTAS would be very easy - kwan-tas. But no "u"? A proofreader at the newspaper I used to work for insisted, in a strictly curmudgeonly way of course, on always pronouncing it "kan-tas". Used to drive his copyholders nuts. Or at least ... I think that's why they were nuts! [confused-on-reflection emoticon]
_________________________
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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#19485 - 02/19/01 04:51 AM
Re: Mangled English for Corporate Identity
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old hand
Registered: 03/15/00
Posts: 1010
Loc: Switzerland
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1- You can't trademark an ordinary (correctly spelled) word.
2- You want your brand to be unique, yet easily remembered, so it has to sound half-familiar, half exotic. Who will remember that "Xerox" was derived from greek xeros, dry, for being the first copying process doing away with messy liquids?
3- Corparations want to remain flexible in their expansion of business. So they don't want to be tied to a particular type of article by their brand name. Maybe this is now the unhappy fate of Xerox. Modern names of corporations avoid association with a product, either by using an acronym of their former name (BASF is an early example), or a fully "synthetic" name like e.g. Syngenta ("born" last year).
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#19486 - 02/19/01 07:52 AM
Re: Mangled English for Corporate Identity
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old hand
Registered: 01/18/01
Posts: 1156
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Here's a confusing one...
In the Canadian provinces of Alberta and British Columbia, the phone company is now called "TELUS" (they used to be BCTel and AGT, Alberta Government Telephones). I think they meant it to sound like "Tell us" but instead, it looks like it's an American telephone company - "Tel US". Which it isn't!
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#19487 - 02/19/01 07:54 AM
Re: Mangled English for Corporate Identity
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old hand
Registered: 11/12/00
Posts: 819
Loc: Portland,Oregon, USA
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You want your brand to be unique, yet easily remembered... and Corporations want to remain flexible in their expansion of business. So they don't want to be tied to a particular type of article by their brand name.Well, I guess that explains why General Electric's logo has been around unchanged for a century! No need for cutesy yuppie-sounding tripe. Most products use electricity, so the name has plenty of latitude. It fits your criteria well, with old-fashioned script. So much for being "modern!" 
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#19489 - 02/19/01 09:15 AM
Re: Mangled English for Corporate Identity
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member
Registered: 12/16/00
Posts: 130
Loc: Virginia
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Well, I guess that explains why General Electric's logo has been around unchanged for a century! No need for cutesy yuppie-sounding tripe. Most products use electricity, so the name has plenty of latitude. It fits your criteria well, with old-fashioned script. So much for being "modern!"
Geoff:
I've done a tiny bit of corporate branding work for GE, it's interesting to note that most of their business now has nothing at all to do with electricity. Their wonderful logo is based on the shape of a fan's rotor blade to reflect one of their earliest products. Most of their marketing these days is to promote their financial assurance services so they never, ever refer to themselves as General Electric anymore. I'm thrilled though that they've kept their old logo intact.
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#19490 - 02/19/01 11:05 AM
Re: Mangled English for Corporate Identity
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 11/25/00
Posts: 3439
Loc: New England, USA
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OK, WOW, let us in on the QANTAS acronym. I'm not an Ozzie, and have never been there, but I know it too. I'll start us off with "Queensland And..." Your turn!
Sorry to be so long answering. Although my life seems to be mainly this board other things do intrude.
Queensland And Northern Territories Airways Service.
So there! Thought you'd caught me out? HA!
Now about that discount ... nobody knows?
wow
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#19491 - 02/19/01 11:14 AM
Re: Mangled English for Corporate Identity
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 11/25/00
Posts: 3439
Loc: New England, USA
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Mumbles heard from afar : "There she is making another post." As she shamelessly works her way toward Old Hand status!
There's an apocryphal story about brand names:
The Japanese had just designed and produced another automobile and it was set to go except for a name. The auto makers decided to call a German auto maker for a suggestion When the situation was explained the German asked when they needed an answer.
"Today!" the Japanese said.
In accented English the German said:
"That soon?"
"Thank you" said the Japanese gentleman
And so that's how Datsun go its name.
(Apologies to our German friends. It's meant as a friendly joke!)
wow
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#19492 - 02/19/01 12:42 PM
Re: Mangled English for Corporate Identity
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 01/18/01
Posts: 13858
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To demonstrate my remarkable command of the obvious, names like "Rite-Aid" arise from the constraints on usage of everyday names or words in a copyright.
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