Changing company name, opinions please

[charlie1]

There are pros and cons. From a legal point of view my understanding is you would be within you rights to do it. Unless Facebook own the rights to the font, they certainly don't own the colour or the box. If you were in the same industry then you'd have a problem but as you are not in direct competition my understanding is that you can't be seen as trading on their name... although in a sense you are using it.

My one concern is that you are putting your eggs in a shallow basket. For instance there is a decorating firm near me that goes under the name of 'Ant & Decorators', quite clever but it says two things, one that the company is new and secondly that Ant & Dec aren't quite as big as there were 3 or 4 years ago and as such the name is losing its appeal.

Even though Facebook is huge at the moment it's not inconceivable that it may fade into obscurity... don't believe me? Look at Friends Reunited or even lastminute... two websites that were massive.


Fablook isn't a bad name in any case, so maybe you could go with it anyway but I would use the whole FB thing as a marketing gimmick on a short term basis rather than set your whole marketing strategy around it

Very informative!! thanks, a lot of info to digest there, thanks again colour rep!

 

[user123]

There are pros and cons. From a legal point of view my understanding is you would be within your rights to do it. Unless Facebook own the rights to the font, they certainly don't own the colour or the box. If you were in the same industry then you'd have a problem but as you are not in direct competition my understanding is that you can't be seen as trading on their name... although in a sense you are using it.

My one concern is that you are putting your eggs in a shallow basket. For instance there is a decorating firm near me that goes under the name of 'Ant & Decorators', quite clever but it says two things, one that the company is new with no history and secondly that Ant & Dec aren't quite as big as they were 3 or 4 years ago and as such the name is losing its appeal.

Even though Facebook is huge at the moment it's not inconceivable that it may fade into obscurity... don't believe me? Look at Friends Reunited or even lastminute... two websites that were massive.


Fablook isn't a bad name in any case, so maybe you could go with it anyway but I would use the whole FB thing as a marketing gimmick on a short term basis rather than set your whole marketing strategy around it

You're a bright fella, aren't ya...