Fairfield County Business Journal The name game
The name game
Handling the move from Downtrodden City to Wealthyville
Businesses are relocating all the time, but what happens when where you’re moving doesn’t match the location in your name?
“It's a difficult conundrum for many businesses, and a great example of why you need to pay good attention to your brand name early on in your business,” said Darryl Ohrt, founder of Plaid Design and Branding in Danbury. “What sounds cute, local and ‘you’ may not reflect well as styles change, your business grows, or you move.”
According to Ohrt, there are good examples of companies who have made these types of moves successfully.
“You have essentially two options; embrace the location as a part of your name, or ignore it and build your brand independently, said Ohrt. “Cannondale bikes is a great example of the latter. Most cyclists across the globe have no concept of a Cannondale, Connecticut. Their branding is strong, and they've made the name work to the point of evolving it into a unique and individual brand.”
Ohrt says other examples include companies like Vermont Teddy Bears.
“It really doesn't matter where they're based, but there are bears in Vermont, right?” said Ohrt. “The perception is that there are good, honest, friendly people waiting to help you in Vermont. They've built a strong brand and embraced the name.”
Alison Statler, founder and president of Contact Public Relations, said that she has considered the possibility of this dilemma in the past for her business. According to Statler, if she were to move her Greenwich-based business to Stamford she would want to keep a Greenwich presence, though she says she would think differently if she were a financial firm or in some other industry.
“It matters what you want to say,” said Statler. “Greenwich carries something with its name for me, but Stamford may say something else.”
According to Steve Gaynes, president of Steven Gaynes Communications, companies making a move should be wary of public relations professionals who approach the issue matter-of-factly.
“You can't make relocation a cookie cutter project,” he said.
According to Chris Usher, director of the Greenwich Workshop Gallery in Fairfield, the decision to keep the name when his company moved was directly dependent on keeping things clear for customers and maintaining that following.
“We had created this high-end art reproduction line and we wanted keep the following we had,” said Usher. “If we had started in Danbury, it would have been the Danbury Workshop Gallery in Fairfield.”
According to Ohrt, the question can be boiled down to perception.
Ohrt pointed to the clothing brand Hollister as an example.
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