What's in a name? About £12.5m in advertising alone

LET us ponder what Thomas Bignold would make of the name Aviva. An educated merchant and banker who lived in Norwich in the 18th century, Mr Bignold may at first have scratched his head before diligent study at the library provided the answer. Aviva is the feminine version of the Hebrew word for spring.

Granted Mr Bignold's initial title was somewhat clumsy, when, in 1797 he formed the "Norwich Union Society for the Insurance of Houses, Stock and Merchandise from Fire". The company operated its own fire brigade and promised to douse the flames of any establishment that bore the Norwich Union mark.

Norwich Union will operate under its new name as of June, and to help old customers accept it the company has embarked on a multi-million pound advertising campaign fronted by Bruce Willis (Walter Willis), Elle Macpherson (Eleanor Gow), Ringo Starr (Richard Starkey), Alice Cooper (Vincent Damon Furnier) and Dame Edna Everage (Barry Humphries) – all individuals for whom their old name was no longer enough.

The slick television advert, directed by Vaughan Arnell, whose previous work includes videos for Robbie Williams, has each star interact with their younger selves and ask: "Would this have happened if my name had been ...?" The implication is that a bright, sparkling new name is a crucial ingredient to success. As the advert insists: "A change of name is not just a change of name, it is a chance to show the world what you've always wanted to be."

But is it? Amanda Mackenzie, the chief marketing officer at Aviva, clearly thinks so and has had experience rubbing out old names and pencilling in the new. While she worked at BT the company ditched its piper logo for a globe and she was at Mars when the Marathon became the Snickers and Opal Fruits transformed into Starbursts.

So why rename Mr Bignold's company after the Hebrew word for spring? "It's not just the Hebrew word for spring, it's also a palindrome and has the Latin word for life – viva – in it." As she explained: "We are very proud that Norwich Union started 200 years ago, selling protection against fire and highway robbery. As Aviva, we are now the fifth-largest insurer in the world. As our business becomes increasingly global, we need one name customers can recognise, wherever they are."

The cost of the campaign has not been disclosed, but it has been estimated that the advert cost more than £12.5 million. "It is a very expensive campaign," said Peter York, who writes on advertising. "The benefit though is that it will only run for six months until the name change and probably only in Britain.

The company is going through a familiar process. It thinks that if it is a 'world player' it needs a 'world' name. But the irony is that at the moment the last thing the public wants is a global financial institution. It wants something that is dull and worthy, like Norwich Union and not at all sleek."

As it is said in the Book of Ecclesiastes: "A good name is better than precious ointment." So the decision to change a company's name is not taken lightly and can result in considerable cost both to the bank balance and brand. The easiest and most successful transitions are made by those companies that truncate an existing name.

For example, British Petroleum became BP, Kentucky Fried Chicken shrunk to KFC while Marks & Spencer became homely M&S. Abbey National became simply "Abbey" in an attempt to be viewed as more friendly and straightforward.

Then, however, there are those companies that appear to dislike simplicity and attempt to replace it with complexity. When the Post Office decided to change its name to Consignia, not even John Roberts, the company's chief executive knew what it meant. The Communication Workers Union campaigned for the name to be dropped, a decision backed by the new chief executive, Allan Leighton, who changed the name again to the Royal Mail.

Ed Brooke, a partner at the marketing company the Leith Agency, said there are benefits to rebranding. "Sometimes the benefits are mostly around reinvention, which in turn generates reappraisal. Sometimes companies are looking to rid themselves of negative baggage. In this instance, the benefit is all about international alignment.

However, he said the high-profile and expensive adverts carry their own problems. "High-profile rebrands are always subject to a degree of media cynicism especially when a high-profile individual rubbishes them, as when Margaret Thatcher hit out at BA. When the airline attempted to downplay its 'Britishness' by replacing the Union Jack livery on its plane's tails, the former prime minister covered a model plane's tail with a napkin."

Aviva is not alone in creating its own words to brand a company. Recent years have seen Thus (a telecoms offspring of ScottishPower), AstraZeneca (a former ICI drugs division) and Uniq (formerly Unigate) formed from a seemingly random assortment of vowels and consonants.

The move has been defended by branding consultants, who insist any controversy will be quickly forgotten. Rita Clifton, the UK chairwoman of Interband, the world's largest brand consultancy, was quoted as saying: "Increasingly, international companies are choosing to rebrand themselves to get away from the parochial connotations. When (the drinks company] Diageo came up with that name it attracted great consternation, but it has been a great success."

Last night, Ms Mackenzie insisted the company was not casting away Thomas Bignold's legacy. "We are celebrating the most unbelievable success story: from a small corner of England to the four corners of the world," she said. Then again, if it doesn't work, a name can always be changed.


Rebranding – it can be a hit and miss affair

CONSIGNIA: Dragon Brands spent two years and an undisclosed sum developing a new name for the Post Office. Keith Wells, who led the consultancy, dismissed "Post Office" as "too generic".

After researchers assessed the Post Office's brand aims under headings such as "physique", "personality" and "presentation" a short list of three names was put forward to the company, with the winner being "Consignia". The name was dumped and replaced by "Royal Mail" after three years.

SONY: The Japanese company were pioneers in more than just electronics. The company was originally called, in English translation, the Tokyo Telecommunications Engineering Corporation. Yet, in the 1950s, co-founder Akio Morita decided to re-name the company and wanted a title that was universal. The name "Sony" was chosen for the brand as a mix of two words. One was the Latin word sonus which is the root of "sonic" and "sound" and the other was "sonny", a familiar term used in 1950s America to call a boy. Morita pushed for a word that does not exist in any language so that they could claim the word "Sony" as their own.

DIAGEO: The company is the largest multinational beer, wine and spirits company in the world and was formed in 1997 from the merger of Guinness plc and Grand Metropolitan plc. This provided an impetus to re-brand with a neutral sounding, largely meaningless name that has, however, proved to be enormously successful.

As the company states: "The word Diageo comes from the Latin for day (dia) and the Greek for world (geo). We take this to mean every day, everywhere, people celebrate with our brands."