Maybe you've heard that Environmental Home Center in Seattle has changed its name to "ecohaus." My initial response: I hated it. But in the interest of fairness, first let me list what appear to be the advantages of the new name:
- It's shorter, and much less of a mouthful to say - three syllables instead of eight syllables.
- It brings the company's three stores - Environmental Home Center in south Seattle and Environmental Building Supplies in Portland and Bend, Oregon - together under one name.
- It looks nice with their new logo.
Now here are my problems with it:
- They don't capitalize the "E." As someone who does a fair amount of writing (for newspapers, websites, newsletters, etc.), I get annoyed by business names that mess with the standard conventions of writing. For example, names where they capitalize every letter, even though the individual letters don't stand for anything, like IKEA or the INTIMAN Theatre. Or names that don't capitalize the first letter. One way writers and editors get around this is by ignoring it. You'll notice that most newspapers will call it Ikea or the Intiman Theatre, without all caps, and I'm sure they will also call this store "Ecohaus," with the first letter capitalized.
- The spelling is not obvious. What good is it that the new name is shorter, if every time you say it, you have to add, "And they spell house h-a-u-s."
- It just seems too trendy and cutesy, with the German spelling for house.
When I mentioned my concerns to Ecohaus' vice president for marketing, she responded: "If there is one thing I’ve learned about naming, it's that it is very hard to please everyone. We tested this name with a group of customers and it was very positively received. It has also been well-received by staff in all of our locations, and it’s also much better than some alternatives we were looking at."
After I received that response, I felt kind of bad about complaining about it. I'm sure I'll get used to the new name. The thing is that I love EHC, I mean Ecohaus. I often mention the store, or products they sell, when doing presentations or interviews about green products.
Company names are just like people's names - Certain names or types of names ebb and flow in popularity. I grew up in the days of Tom, Mark, Tim, Mary, Patty, Ellen - how many babies have you met lately with those names? Today one trend I don't like in company names is the made-up names with weird spellings - like Cingular or Qwest. Ecohaus fits right in.
For green businesses, starting the name with "Eco" seems to be getting more popular. I guess we were unintentionally a little ahead of the curve when I started my EcoConsumer column for the Seattle Times in April 2005. Now there's EcoMetro, the website you're on right now, and Ecohaus, among many others. Occasionally some people still pronounce it like "echo," but most people, including myself, say "Eeeko."
Green businesses have it tough because they only have a few choices if they want to reflect that in their name: Green, Eco, Environmental. As interest in the environment becomes more mainstream, maybe more words will emerge to denote green-ness. Any suggestions?