Tommy Boy: But the “Callahan” factory’s been in my family for years, you just can’t shut it down!Zalinksy: Son, you gotta look at it from my point of view. Callahan’s a premium name. That’s what I’m buying. I can make the parts in one of my factories, put ‘em in a Callahan box, and sell ‘em in my stores at a premium price. Why keep your factory going when all I want is the goddamned box?
A scene from the movie Tommy Boy, discussing the importance of a name in business.
In upstate New York (I'm not sure about elsewhere) there were quite a few changes in the 80s/90s with drugstores being owned and operated by a few different people. From being Carl's Drugstore to then Faye's Drugstore, to then Eckerd Drugs, and then some of those Eckerd's being bought out in the area by Rite Aid, it was tough to keep up with whatever your local pharmacy's name was. My mother, to this day still calls the local Eckerds, "Carl's" & "Faye's" from time to time. I know they existed as different entities for awhile, but I don't know how long either of those two companies were around before I was born. To my mother these store names are cemented in her memory as the stores she grew up with.
I'm noticing it even more now too with the Tops buyout of P&C, two northeast grocery store chains. People still say, "Hey, I'm going to go grab some stuff over at P&C, do you need anything?" Even though it's been Tops for months. Changing a name is not an easy task.
Branding & Re-Branding
Buyouts and mergers happen all the time. Re-branding, new logos, different slogans are all a part of staying fresh and keeping up with the times. It is important to know your audience and act accordingly because people identify with those images and words. They trust your company because of those things in conjunction with customer service or the good times they've had at your establishment. There's a lot to be said for, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." That cannot be more evident than with the recent GAP logo debacle where after a terrible new design of their classic logo, people were up in arms and within only 2-3 days, Gap scrapped the logo and went back to what was tried and true.
Tradition
I wrote about reconnecting with your college self the other day because this week is Syracuse University's Homecoming. Homecomings happen all across America, generally in the fall and centered around a football game. Homecoming is usually a school's biggest tradition if only because it is something that every student and alumni can take part in. Sure, there will always be bigger events on campus, but no one event outside of Homecoming can appeal to every single one of your students. The one thing that each individual has in common, is that they're all at this establishment together & for a common goal of experience & education. Homecoming centers around that simple idea, and is the easiest kind of branded event you can have.
I don't know when it happened, maybe while I was away from the country, but my Alma Matter re-branded Homecoming to be "Orange Central." A name that I had seen in mailings and quickly wrote off as something happening on campus for students that didn't concern Alumni. The name meant nothing to me.
Maybe I am destined to be like my mother as she continues after all these years to call a drugstore by it's former company name because it's so ingrained in her memory, and I will call this "Orange Central" Homecoming for the rest of my life. For this Alumni, it wasn't broken and there was no need to fix this particular tradition. A name was everything.