There's something about that name

"What's in a name, a rose by any other name would smell as sweet", said Juliet to Romeo in the 15th century. But today if you are a mastermind behind some of the world’s biggest brands, an answer to that Shakespearean question is a lot of brainstorming, some hits, maybe some misses, and an eventual landing on the perfect brand name.

Here I cover some surprising backstories about two brands - one international and one Indian brand. Read on for some trivia:

Story No. 1: How a badge became an identity

In the late 1830s, Mr. Henri who was in the business of making fertilizers and gaslighting, saw his neighbor's 10-month-old son - Warner suffering from undernourishment. Infantile undernourishment those days could cost the child its life. Mr. Henri in an attempt to save his neighbor's son experimented with a concoction of wheat-sugar-milk that was fed to the child. Warner was saved and several people in the village started approaching Mr. Henri to save their children too. 

Since this concerned kids & their life, Mr. Henri decided to put the seal of his surname (sort of a badge) on every concoction that he gave away - taking complete responsibility of every mixture that left his lab. 

Mr. Henri's surname was "Nestle" and rest we know is history.

Till date, we see the Nestle badge (logo) on every product that the company manufactures. Here the objective isn't just to create a higher recall, but to show that the company takes ownership of every unit that it makes. Did you know that even today the Chairman-MD of Nestle India pins up this badge to his attire as a symbol of accountability?

And the concoction that I wrote about is our very own Cerelac!

Story No. 2: How the world's largest identity project got its name

The second story is about an Indian brand - something that has become synonymous with our identity today.

So the story goes that a group of government officials was working on creating a unique identification system that gave identity to every Indian individual. The team had developed a prototype but were struggling to find a name that would resonate with every Indian.

While the core team was on a nationwide tour, they halted at the Mogiyathana village of Rajasthan. During the halt, a volunteer from the team was having a casual chat with a villager about their project - when the villager liked his concept and remarked, "Pehchaan hi toh jeevan ka aadhar hai".

This was a bingo moment for the volunteer, who summoned his team members and the UIDAI project came to be known as Aadhar (our modern-day Aadhar card).

Have any more interesting backstories? Then do share them in the comments below.

Happy weekend! :)