Monday, January 28, 2013

What's in a Name? Famous Brand Name Changes

Recent conversation between myself and my fourteen-year-old grandson:

Me - Hey, how about Colonel Sanders for dinner?
Grandson - What's that?
Me - You know, Colonel Sanders. Kentucky Fried Chicken.
GS - [long pause] Oh! KFC. Sure.

I know the kids tend to refer to everything by initials (I blame texting) but I was still surprised  my grandson didn't know the actual name of his favorite chicken place. Until my husband got home with the meal and I noticed all the packages sported the same image- three big red letters: KFC.

Curiosity led me to do a little quick research and I discovered Colonel Sanders' Kentucky Fried Chicken changed it's name officially to KFC in 1999.  I guess I wasn't paying attention that year. Or any of the years since then. *hangs head in embarrassment*

But while I was checking out the brand name change at KFC, I came across a couple others you might find interesting.

Ever heard of Brad's Drink?  In 1893, a pharmacist named Celeb Bradham invented a carbonated soft drink which included sugar, cola nuts, and the digestive enzyme pepsin. I guess he thought that last one was  important because in 1898 he re-named his invention Pepsi-Cola.

How about Jerry and David’s Guide to the World Wide Web? In January 1994, Jerry Yang and David Filo, PhD students at Stanford, created what became one of the most prominent search engines on the web. They later renamed it Yahoo, an acronym for "Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle".

Okay, one more.  Do you know BackRub?  The search engine created by Larry Brin and Serge Page’s technology in 1996 was called BackRub because the system verified backlinks to determine the significance of a site. I think you've probably used this one. In 1998, they changed the name to Google.

Have you ever had the urge to change your "brand" name?

[I didn't include any images in this post because they would have been big corporate logos and I didn't want to commit a no-no against any of these guys.]

Thought for the Day:

We never really grow up, we only learn how to act in public.







18 comments:

Maria Zannini said...

Cool. Aside from The Colonel, I didn't know the stories of any of the others.

LD Masterson said...

Maria - Well, you're ahead of me. I didn't even know about the Colonel. :-)

Stacy McKitrick said...

You're not alone. I didn't know KFC had originally changed their name, either. I still call the place Kentucky Fried (I leave off the chicken!!).

I did know that Federal Express officially changed their name to FedEx, though. Why that stuck with me, is the puzzler, though! I don't even use them!

Linda G. said...

Whoa. Kentucky Fried Chicken changed its name? Huh. News to me.

Thanks for the logo lesson! :)

Tara Tyler said...

awesome useless info! and thats the best grown up definition ever!

Carol Kilgore said...

I knew about KFC, but not about the others. Many days I wish Larry and Serge would give me a BackRub instead of a Google :)

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

I knew about Brad's Drink. Pepsi's home is New Bern, NC.

LD Masterson said...

Stacy - Nice to know I'm not the only one who missed the KFC name change.

Hey, did you here the one about the woman in New Orleans after Katrina who was asked how she was handling all the churches being destroyed? She said, "Oh, I don't worry about that. I like to get my chicken from Popeye."

LD Masterson said...

Linda G. - Hah! I'm feeling better and better.

LD Masterson said...

Tara - Useless? There's going to be a quiz later.

LD Masterson said...

Carol - Oh yeah. I need a back rub from spending too much time on Google.

LD Masterson said...

Alex - Ah, home town advantage.

DL Hammons said...

I changed my brand name from Don to DL! But you know that already, don't you? :)

Jemi Fraser said...

Love the yahoo acronym! And google is much more marketable than BackRub! Good choice ;)

LD Masterson said...

DL - Yup. Just like I went from Linda to LD.

LD Masterson said...

Jemi - I don't know, BackRub could be kind of appealing.

Julie Flanders said...

This is interesting. I had no idea where the name Yahoo came from. And I never would have guessed this LOL.

Thanks for coming by my blog, it's great to meet you!

Mike Keyton said...

Really interesting. I compile a New Year Quiz when we all get together. These will be on it! Thank you, Linda!