Courtesy of Yahoo News
An article written by Oscar Hui about a florida condominium complex and an ad agency in Auckland wanting to change its name in order to disaffiliate itself with the terrorist group ISIS. Many companies have fallen victim to this same predicament. While Oscar does mention that Reis and Trout recommend avoiding abrasive names that could tarnish a company’s reputation there is still an underlying question of whether or not company’s should make the change. While ISIS is a major issue at present, most everyone recognizes the fact that these companies are named after the Egyptian goddess Isis (Goddess of Magic and Life).
It is ultimately a company’s decision on an individual case-to-case basis whether or not they should change their name, there is also the possibility that in the future, ISIS will not be a major threat or news centric issue, and a company who changed its relatively unique name to a more generic name in haste would lose business to the same name sharing hinderance that Reis and Trout advises against.
The bottom line is not clear cut, however, if a company has a name that is well thought out and unique (similarly to Isis), than a name change will essentially become a sunk cost. If a company does not have a creative name readily available, it is best not to rush the decision to change the name, because this could cause more than just a sunk cost for the company—it could hinder the business throughout marketing as well (not just accounting).