What's in a Name? So we discovered yesterday that, through the wonders of common-law trademark, we're going to need to ditch my wife's brand identity. She's fine in LA - but there's an existing business in Seattle whose logo and name are like a shitty version of hers. Unfortunately they've been in practice long enough to have earned the rights to their shitty logo and shitty name, and should my wife move her business (a $2500 process, just for the tax documents) without coming up with a new corporate identity, we are "diluting" their brand. So that sucks. It's entirely possible I'd seen them and subconsciously modeled our shit on theirs. It's just begging for improvement, which is pretty much what my wife's brand is. She's good enough that if you google (common noun) (common verb) you get her business. Whereas theirs is (common noun) (adjective) (adjective) (noun) (adjective) (noun) but two of those five words are synonyms for my wife's noun'n'verb so we're pretty much fucked. To be clear - I'm delighted that "common law trademark" is a thing. It's protective of all the right things. I just wish I'd discovered it myself (I did an exhaustive trademark search and found nothing and assumed we were okay). And to be clear - this is an opportunity to retrench, reconfigure and rebrand. Kind of a bummer that all we're taking north is an EIN, though. So in pursuit of new identities, we went hunting last night. Birth centers want to be welcoming - so "sanctuary" or "refuge" or "haven" are great choices, and all COMPLETELY taken. So then you start looking for synonyms of "house" and they're all awesome. - "The Birth Hole" - "Birth Shanty" - "The Birth Shack" ...all of which go very well with the logo our (extremely talented and witty) web designer suggested. So then you go down the list of north-westy things. Trillium Birth. Taken. Cedars birth. taken. Puget Sound anything. Taken. So you start leafing through plant spotting guides for the Pacific Northwest and you discover that this beautiful and unassuming little plant, all 5 centimeters of it: ...is called NAKED BROOMRAPE. (someone hates the fuck out of that plant) And that's about where you try on "Naked broomrape birth center" for fun, roll off the couch, recognize that there aren't many combinations of words more likely to grenade one's business than "Naked Broomrape (anything)" and decide you should go to bed, it's midnight, you're drunk. And then your daughter wakes you up at 6am.