“Strange fascination, fascinating me: Changes are taking the pace” From the song Changes, written and performed by David Bowie
Anyone bought anything from the Marafuku Company or the Matsushita Electric Corporation of America lately? No? I find that hard to believe. How about a drink from Il Giornale Coffee Company or Brad's Drink’s? Nah?... I think you’ll find you have. It’s just that like many those three illustrious companies have changed their names.
Nintendo, Panasonic, Starbucks and Pepsi-cola sound a little more familiar don’t they?
It’s odd how a simple name change makes a big difference.
Film stars have been at that game for a while… Maurice Micklewhite certainly doesn’t have the cachet of Michael Caine, and
Archibald Leach just isn’t as smooth as Cary Grant. Let us not even think of how Oscar winning actress Goldie Hawn would have faired as Jean Studlendegehawn! Sometimes the name you start out with just doesn’t cut the mustard. Of course some of the greats just HAD to change their names even though the one they started out with had perfect movie star attributes… the actor Stewart Granger was in fact called James Stewart a name was already taken… by James Stewart of course!
However name changes are not just limited to mega-corporations or those who flicker on the silver screen.
Taking a trot round my local shops I noticed there has indeed been an awful lot of rebranding going on… right here in the ‘burbs!
When I was a teenager, if you wanted to look ‘hot’, you got the latest jeans from Chelsea Girl. Skinny jeans, bootleg jeans, high waist jeans, bleached jeans, dark jeans, black jeans, jeans with patterns, flared jeans… if you needed jeans, you Had to go to Chelsea Girl. The same shop I used to frequent is still on my local high street. I peaked in and just like in my day, the music thumped out and discerning teenagers mused over their choices.
But it’s not called Chelsea Girl. It’s had its name changed to River Island. Same shop. Same purpose. Same target market. Ah well… maybe they just fancied a change, cause no one knows why… it seems to be run by the same people.
The fate of Bakers Oven… where we’d get ring donuts ladened in granulated sugar (my goodness how did any of our teeth survive into adulthood?!)… is more clearly known. Bakers Oven became part of the Greggs Bakery chain, in what I can only think was a revenge attack from the Northerners for what we Southerners did to them in the 1980’s. But eeky-thump and meat pies makes room for a tooth rot donut still!
Bejam’s, where most of the boys from youth club used to have Saturday jobs as it was considered manly to work with frozen carcasses, has become Iceland. The adverts claiming ‘Mum’s go to Iceland’ has killed all associations with the movie Rocky along with the Bejam name.
Most of my mates had Saturday jobs in Presto. We saw Glenda Jackson doing her shopping in the Blackheath branch, so it was quite the thing. Presto changed its name to Safeway. Of course Safeway are long gone…swallowed up by Morrisons in the battle for the high street.
But it’s not just the shops that have changed names; the products in them have too.
In an attempt to further rot my teeth, I used to chomp regularly through a thick bar of chocolate laden with sugar loaded caramel and processed peanuts. I thought it was well named as you certainly HAD to run 26 miles afterwards to burn of the calories you’d just ingested. But the Marathon is no more. It is now called a Snicker… and like River Island… we have no idea why. It just is.
Marathon isn’t the only sweetie to go this way. Opal Fruits (made to make your mouth water) is now a Starburst, and stupidly of all Wispa’s became Dairy Milk Bubbles. For no reason at all.
Household cleaning agents went from Jif (it’ll have it clean in a jif) to Cif. Kitchen towels went from Bounty to Plenty. Charmin toilet tissue became Cushelle. Why?... hey no one is gonna tell us anything other than how much to pay (which by the way is more as those funky new wrappers did not come cheap!).
At the chemist… change is a foot. Boots the chemist is still Boots… but it feels no need to tell you that it is a chemist now, but the products are a little different. I expect beauty products to change as technology moves on, but the same old crap in a bottle with a new name? No… I am NOT being cynical … Immac is now Veet, Oil of Ulay is now Olay and so it goes on. All for no good reason.
Funny how things change without changing at all. Old things get new names but remain to be the same old things they ever were.
Michael Caine got his two Oscars with Maurice Micklewhite’s skills.
Nintendo Wii sells well with the technology from the Marafuku Company.
Starbucks Vanilla Americano Grande tastes just as good as it did in an Il Giornale Coffee Company cup.
River Island still offer the same unreal jean choice that put Chelsea Girl at the top of a teenagers shopping list.
Greggs will offer buy one get one half price on tooth rot donut just like Bakers Oven did.
And smearing your face with Olay will hold back time just as much as Oil of Ulay ever did.
Everything changes… and nothing changes.
It’s just re-branding.
A fresh lick of paint to keep things fresh I guess.
However, there is one product that really needed a name change. I recall the advert went:
“Why diet when you can enjoy Ayds?... Ayds helps you lose weight safely and effectively!"
Ah…. The top selling appetite suppressant of the early 1980’s – Ayds. A wonderful concept whereby munching through bars of butterscotch and chocolate guaranteed a slimmer body also had this misfortune to have a name that sounds like a dreadful disease. You won’t be able to find that on the shelves now. Yup… I’m afraid Ayds is no more. For obvious reasons!
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