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Timing is everything

Blogging from Squaw Valley Ski Resort, where we have been blessed with 48 hours of non-stop rain. The good news? Forecast teperature for each of the next three days is a winter wonderlandy 69 degrees.

Still, it could be worse. Bill O’Reilly could be getting laid this year - in Nevada anyway.

That visual should stop those sugar plums from dancing in your head.

WHERE’S THE AUSTRALUS?

If it was good enough for a rodent, it’s good enough for a marsupial.

Just in time for Christmas, which is actually summer in Australia, and explains a whole lot, comes news that kangaroo meat may henceforth be called “australus,” as in, “How do you want your australus? Rare, medium or well done?”

The folks behind this rebranding effort claim they want to encourage more people to eat kangaroo meat, but we think there is a more sinister motive — pest control.

To us here in the Northern Hemisphere, the kangaroo is a cute hopping animal, most notably epitomized by “Kanga” one of the stars of Winnie the Pooh’s universe. In Australia however, even though it is a national symbol, it is a pest. With nearly 50 million of them running around, there is a yearly culling to control the size of the kangaroo population. And what do they do with the culled roos you ask? They make pet food.
They also sell the meat as people food. But the only people who really like kangaroo meat are the Japanese and the Germans who turn it into sausage.

If this rebranding of a rapidly multiplying pest sounds familiar it is. Remember the coypu? A few years ago, Louisiana was swarming with these water rats who were eating everything in sight and causing untold amounts of damage. So the folks in Louisiana decided, it was either eat or be eaten. But who wants to eat water rat? So their solution was to rename the rat Nutria.

So you see, renaming kangaroo meat “australus” is really just pest control disguised as fine dining.

Landor terror alert elevated

Your branding tax dollars at work, creating an empty vessel. From today’s Washington Post:

The Department of Homeland Security was only a month old, and already it had an image problem.

It was April 2003, and Susan Neely, a close aide to DHS Secretary Tom Ridge, decided the gargantuan new conglomeration of 22 federal agencies had to stand for something more than multicolored threat levels. It needed an identity — not the “flavor of the day in terms of brand chic,” as Neely put it, but something meant to last.

So she called in the branders.

Neely hired Landor Associates, the same company that invented the FedEx name and the BP sunflower, and together they began to rebrand a behemoth Landor described in a confidential briefing as a “disparate organization with a lack of focus.” They developed a new DHS typeface (Joanna, with modifications) and color scheme (cool gray, red and hints of “punched-up” blue). They debated new uniforms for its armies of agents and focus-group-tested a new seal designed to convey “strength” and “gravitas.” The department even got its own lapel pin, which was given to all 180,000 of its employees — with Ridge’s signature — to celebrate its “brand launch” that June.

“It’s got to have its own story,” Neely explained.

Nearly three years after it was created in the largest government reorganization since the Department of Defense, DHS does have a story, but so far it is one of haphazard design, bureaucratic warfare and unfulfilled promises. The department’s first significant test — its response to Hurricane Katrina in August — exposed a troubled organization where preparedness was more slogan than mission.

Happy Merry!

MTV + Igor = URGE

MTV has just announced the name of their new digital music service, named by Igor. From the press release:

MTV Networks, a division of Viacom Inc and Microsoft Corp. today announced they have collaborated on the design and development of MTV Networks’ new digital music service called URGE…

….URGE will offer rich entertainment programming and innovative tools designed to guide musical discovery and connect fans to the artists and music they love. Offering more than 2 million songs from the major labels and thousands of independents, URGE will encompass all musical genres, from alt-country to zydeco. In addition to a broad catalogue of music choices, URGE will deliver a deep well of exclusive MTV Networks programming and original, hand-crafted content…

…”As with everything we do at MTV Networks, every element of URGE is being developed with our audience in mind,” said Jason Hirschhorn, MTV Networks’ Chief Digital Officer. “Beyond providing a simple transactional service, URGE will provide a musical playground where fans can explore, customize, discover and download new music.”

…Upon its debut next year, URGE will be promoted through multiple venues, including the MTV, VH1 and CMT channels, which on average collectively reach more than 165 million viewers U.S., as well as through the respective brands’ Web sites and Urge.com. Additional details of the new service will be unveiled in January at the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

You’ll be able to satisfy your URGE here.

More blogs about URGE.

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Standard naming wisdom

Quite to the contrary, it would be perfect for Victoria’s Secret.

From London with love

Today’s Telegraph brings us a salient article on corporate naming by Brian Millar. Here’s a taste:

In the 1990s, the professionals moved in. The company-names-are-a-serious-business business was spearheaded by Landor Associates, a San Francisco-based design group that was so cool its headquarters were a ship. Landor brought “methodologies” with them. Rigorous, mysterious methodologies.

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If you ever wondered where those bizarre unpronounceable company names come from, look to the Landor crew. Avolar, Midea, Avaya, Spherion, Onity, Lucent. And Lucent’s rival, Agilient. You know, like Lucent - but agile! Nice. Soon lots of big branding companies were picking up briefs and now our world is littered with Arrivas, Aptivas, Achievas and Avandas.

How did they persuade boards to part with vast sums of money for something that had always been free, and was better when it was? Here’s an answer from Interbrand’s website: “The chosen name, Xingux, is derived from a word with many positive connotations by using ’signo’ (sign) with the abstract device of starting and ending with a letter X. The visual identity communicates the dynamism of the group’s business.”

Browsing these explanations is like reading the minute scrawls of a lunatic obsessive recluse: “Qarana originated from an Indian language called Jain meaning ‘to cause’… Hospira… is an abstract of the words hospital, spirit and inspire and the Latin word spero meaning hope.”

So that’s the important Jain and ancient Roman markets sewn up then.

The rest of the article contains many more spot-on insights by Mr. Millar, as well as the usual well-worn “wisdom” of some idiot from Igor. Full article here.

Interestingly, Landor now claims to be looking to hire coherent people. At least one anyway. If you’d like to crawl inside for a look, now is your chance. From craigslist.

More blogs about naming companies.

Dum and Dummer

Governor Dummer Academy in Massachusetts, where the tuition runs north of 33k a year, is the nation’s oldest boarding school. But that’s about to change, the name that is. Some Jackassian (yes, it’s a philosophy) market research firm has told the school to abandon the 250 year old name in favor of “Governor Academy”. Why? According to Jackassian theory, 250 years of history means little when you have a name like Dummer. Yet somehow this has not stopped them from amassing a 60 million dollar endowment or from getting 7 times more applicants per year than they have room to accommodate. Naturally the name change plan has irritated their once generous alumni. From the Associated Press:

Jokes about Gov. Dummer Academy, the nation’s oldest independent boarding school, are about to become history.

The Newbury school’s board of trustees voted Saturday to shed the “Dummer” and change its name to The Gov.’s Academy.

Gov. Dummer Academy will remain the legal name of the institution, but its official “doing business as” name will change with the start of the next fiscal year, on July 1, 2006.

A group of alumni fought to preserve the school’s name as a tribute to William Dummer, who served as acting governor of the Massachusetts colony during the late 1720s. Dummer donated the land for the school, which was founded as “Dumm’r Charity School” in 1763.

Plans to change the name were announced in a letter that board president Dan Morgan sent to alumni following a preliminary vote by trustees in December 2004.

Morgan said a marketing company headed by an Dummer alumnus conducted a national survey of prospective families and students and concluded that the school’s name “can stand in the way of our gaining our deserved recognition.”

“The board of trustees believes the long-term interests of the Academy are best served by implementation of this change in the school name,” Morgan said in a written statement Saturday.

Many alumni protested in the wake of Morgan’s letter, so the board agreed to rethink the decision. On Saturday, however, 28 of 30 trustees voted in favor of the name change. The other two abstained from voting.

“We want to be as appealing and attractive as we can be to prospective students,” said Judith Klein, the school’s director of communications. “Research has shown that the current name has been an impediment.”

To appease critics of the name change, trustees agreed to include the words, “Established in 1763 by Gov. Wm. Dummer” on the school’s printed name and seal.

That gesture doesn’t satisfy Michael Smith, a 1954 graduate who circulated a letter to fellow alumni that criticized the name change.

“What a travesty,” Smith said of the board’s vote. “They’re forgetting history.”

Can you imagine the market research questions on this name? We can, because they’re always the same:

If the Academy were a shoe, what kind of shoe would it be?

Which of the following words best embody accomplishment and duty:

A) Dumb
B) Dummer
C) Governor
D) Dummest

If you were a board member or trustee of this school, which name would your country club friends be most impressed by:

A) Stupid
B) Dummer
C) Governor
D) Idiot

When you send your child to boarding school, you are hoping they become:

A) Out of sight and out of mind
B) Dummer
C) Governor
D) Homosexual and pregnant

Naming research designed solely to validate an existing agenda reads very close to the above. We think the Dummer community is smart enough to see through an effort as Jackassian as this, that Dummer minds will prevail, and the good Dummer name will be back in place shortly.

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