What would you call your business? Would you use the initials of your name or search through the history books or pick a name from past experiences? Here are some examples of companies and how they derived their famous names:
Amstrad – this company was formed by Lord Alan Sugar and a contraction of Alan Michael Sugar Trading.
ASDA – the name originated in 1965 after the merger of the Asquith chain of supermarkets and Associated Dairies.
BMW – Bayerische Motoren Werke or in English, Bavarian Motor Works.
Google – initially a misspelling of ‘googol’, but the company settled on its name as google.com was an unregistered domain name.
Haribo – stems from Hans Reigel, the company founder’s name, and Bonn the company’s home town.
Hovis – was thought up in 1890 by Herbert Grimes as part of a competitionto find a name for S.Fitton and Sons’ flour. He derived the name from hominis vis, latin for ‘strength of man’ and received the princely sum of £25.
IKEA – Taken from the first letters of the founder Ingvar Kamprad’s name, the farm on which he grew up, Elmtaryd and the small nearby village, Agunnaryd.
Lego – from the Danish leg godt, which means ‘play well’.
Nikon – derived from Nippon Kogaku, meaning ‘Japanese Optical’.
Qantas – initials of it’s original name – Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services.
Skype – originally conceived as Sky peer-to-peer, then Skyper and finally settled as Skype.
Starbucks – named after a strong and steady ship’s mate in Herman Melville’s novel Moby-Dick.
Virgin – One of Richard Branson’s assistant said “What about Virgin? We’re complete virgins at business’. And it stuck!
So why not try and think of something catchy as a name of a dream company for you – it could be fun and you never know you might even end up on a web page like this one.