Cognition #26: I named a brand in March; here is the step-by-step breakdown

Case study on how I've put on my thinking hat to name a supermarket brand.

Apr 30, 2023

February 27th, Bangalore:

I was chilling in the morning, having my lemon tea at Indiranagar Zostel.

Few minutes later, I opened LinkedIn to check what’s up with the world, and I received an inmail mentioning a brand was looking for a strategist and would like to schedule a call to discuss more.

I said, “Okay, I’m travelling, and we will have this call as soon as I get back to Hyderabad.”

I was back home a couple of days later. I took their call, and what happened after that was rather one of the most interesting stories of my freelance career.

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What happened on the call?

First, The manager asked me, “Can you share a portfolio of the brands you have named so far?”

I got confused and replied, “I never named brands.”

Both the manager and his assistant didn’t have a clue about how to take this forward. His assistant broke the silence and informed me that one of her colleagues told her I named brands well—looking at Cognition and Vikra’s Café.

We then realized it was a misunderstanding and clarified that I do content strategy and never named brands.

But since we were already on the call, I insisted the manager give a brief of what they require for their brand.

Apparently, the brand was coming up with a subsidiary company—a supermarket chain across Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. They wanted to start locally and were aiming to scale nationwide with time.

My job was to give a name to this company.

Honestly, I found the gig interesting and wanted to give it a shot.

I conveyed the same to the manager and told him I would come up with a set of questions. And if the answers make me feel I can take up this gig, I will.

He agreed to it.

Step 1: Understanding the brand

These are the questions I shared to figure out what the brand is looking for:

Give some competitor names.
Where are you planning to set up the initial branches? Are you planning to keep it local or expand all over the county?
Do you want to add any local element to the brand name? (Like including Telugu words since it’s the regional language)
Do you have any specifications for the number of words?
What’s your opinion on the tagline? Do you think your brand should have one?
Do you associate your brand with any specific color?
Do you have pictures of how the store looks?
The store is like a supermarket, right? Correct me if I’m wrong.
What do you want your brand to represent? (Don’t overthink. Just write down all words that come to your mind)
Share a few of your favourite brand names that align with your brand values (Don’t have to be in the same industry)

I reviewed their answers and felt I could take up the project.

I quoted my price.
They transferred 50% in advance.
And I began working.

Step 2: Research Phase One

I googled all the supermarkets that ever existed—locally, nationwide, and globally.

I tried to find patterns in the names of these supermarkets. From popular suffixes, prefixes, and power words to completely unique brand names and their locations, I noted everything.

Step 2: Research Phase Two

I ran polls on groups and DMed a few smart people asking simple questions like

What words among these do you think are most suitable to associate with a supermarket brand?
or
What words come to your mind when I say the word supermarket?

The idea was to identify words familiar to the audience and then reverse engineer them into the brand name.

Step 3: The actual work

At this point, I had all the information I needed to name the brand.

So I’ve put my thinking hat on and came up with 15-20 names in different categories:

With popular prefixes
With popular suffixes
Based on words suggested in polls
Based on words + observations I made during my research
Based on client inputs

…and more.

Step 4: Validation

This time, I want to test the names.

I shortlisted a few on the first iteration and posted them in different groups + people I know, asking them, ‘If you own a supermarket brand, what name among these would you like your brand to have?’

I considered their preferences and my perspectives to reduce the number to seven.

Then, I presented these names to the client.

Three of my favourite names

There were a few local names (with Telugu words) in the list, but these three remain my favourite:

Trolley
GrocerOne
NutriShop

What got selected?

Unfortunately none.

It would have been a good fairy tale where I walked into the store I named, but it didn’t happen. Yet.

The company's chairman suggested a name, and the team proceeded with it.

They cleared the remaining payment, and the project ended.

Note for you:

Honesty has been one of my content’s core principles, which is why I didn’t want to hide the fact that the names I suggested got rejected.

It is what it is, but I loved the process of naming a brand—and I didn’t want to miss out on sharing it with you.

Hence, this case study.

I hope it helps if you have to name a brand anytime soon.

That being said, it’s the end of our technical segment.

Coming up next:

Non-technical aka Fun Segment

Movies/Shows I loved recently

Uhmm, what am I watching these days?

Done with ~80 episodes of Boruto. Might begin Demon Slayer or Death Note next.
Watched the first three films of John Wick to watch the fourth part in the theaters, but couldn’t get time for it yet. Loved the three parts, though.
Watched Virupaksha (Telugu) in theaters. It was okayish.
Love Today on Netflix is good.