Shopping strips and malls are
littered with companies whose original names have now been
replaced with initials. Those initials often reveal a pearl or
interesting fact of the history of the company.
In some instances,
businesses attempt to change the meaning of their initials.
British Petroleum, better known to the world as BP, decided in
2000 that its name now stood for “beyond petroleum”.
B&M comes from
Billington & Mayman as it was set up by Malcolm Billington
but shortened to B&M for Bargain Madness.
Some initials quite
obvious, depending on where you live. ANZ is the Australia and
New Zealand Banking Group; BWS stands for “Beers, Wines and
Spirits”.
H&M comes from the
official name Hennes & Mauritz AB. It is a Swedish
multinational clothing-retail company.
The ASOS fashion brand
and online megastore started as a supplier of unbranded clothes
to celebrities on TV and the idea was people could find clothes
and accessories they had seen celebs wearing. Before long people
started referring to AsSeenOnScreen as ASOS and in late 2000 the
domain name www.asos.com was bought.
QVC comes from Quality
Value Convenience. It sums up the service the shopping channel
provides. QVC was set up by Joseph Segel in Pennsylvania in 1986
and it now broadcasts to over 350 million households in seven
countries across the globe.
CVS pharmacy chain was
founded in Lowell, MA in 1963, and was known as "Consumer Value
Stores." Over time the name became abbreviated to simply CVS.
Kmart's big red K.
Officially the K does not stand for anything and the brand has
only ever read in Australia as “Kmart”. The American company’s
history goes back to traveling salesman Sebastian Spering Kresge
from Pennsylvania. In 1897, he opened his first store in Memphis
and by the 1950s Mr Kresge had 600 stores bearing his surname.
Do you remember SS Kresge? The stores began to convert to the
simpler Kmart brand in 1962, the K is a nod to its founder.
Kresge died in 1966.
JBL, the speaker
company is named after its founder, James Bullough Lansing. He
was born James Martini in 1902, but at 25, he changed his name
to James Lansing.
KFC changed from
Kentucky Fried Chicken and the public relations reason given for
the name change was that health-conscious consumers associated
the word “fried” with “unhealthy” and “high cholesterol.”
According to KFC,
during 1991, Kentucky Fried Chicken decided on a name change to
KFC. "In reality, we wanted to let our customers know that we
had more for them to enjoy than just fried chicken, and many
were already calling us KFC, as it was much easier to say."
Incidentally, KFC is
owned by Yum! Brands. It operates Taco
Bell, KFC, Pizza Hut, and WingStreet worldwide.