What’s in a name? A lot apparently, as entrepreneurs, artists, and makers of all kinds spend enormous amounts of energy searching for the right name for their business, project, organization, or creation. Below, you’ll find the stories of how various successful brands, creators and entrepreneurs came up with their names.

Dolo Rose Brewer

Seny is more than a name, it’s a feeling of belonging. When I emigrated to the US from Guinea at age 15, I met another Guinean girl named Seny, who would become my dearest friend. Read more>>

Kay So

Emit’s Farm and Adventure Park. Emit is spelled backward for TIME, because time is precious. It took me losing my dad in an accident, to realized how precious time is. I create events for the public as a gift to them. Read more>>

Kristen Ziegler

In February 2010, I started a blog called Minima{list} to document my experiences surviving the recession. I was underemployed and earning less than $20K/year working multiple part time jobs. Read more>>

Dicey Grenor

Spicy Dicey Productions is a media and entertainment company that focuses on erotic, sci-fi, fantasy, horror books, podcasts, and TV/films. Naming the company was easy because I had already done the hard part of naming my author pseudonym over a decade ago–Dicey Grenor. Read more>>

Malik Green

coming up as an only child with no siblings for the majority of my life i wanted brothers and sisters some likeminded people to call family which lead to us naming the team Fomily Means Everything Read more>>

Micah Blosser

Capturing a moment or telling a story from my perspective has always been incredibly interesting. I have been creating videos since I was a young kid with a VHS recorder. Read more>>

Melissa Copenhaguen

Picking a name for my business was a fun process. I remembered a nickname, “Lolis,” given to me by my sister. Even though I didn’t like it at first, I decided to go with it. Read more>>

Adam Beechen

My last name is Beechen. Pretty straightforward, right? Well, during college I interned in the sports department of the local NBC affiliate and became friendly with the producers, editors and on-air talent. Read more>>

Michael Cody

A friend of mine that I know very well is actually the person that named my business. Andrew and I have been close for many years and his understanding of the way I live and look at the world is what gave us our name Read more>>

Rickeya Tatum

The name of my company is called B. Tatum consulting LLC. The original name would have been Tatums incorporated LLC, but with my company beung a small business, I was unable to use any language of incorporated, foundation, etc. Read more>>

Lewis Olaoluwa

Coming up with a name proved extremely challenging in the early phases of developing our brand. In 2018, we, the owners of Traditional Trims L.L.C. visited Nigeria where we were inspired by the multipurpose functionality of their everyday attire called “Kaftan”. Read more>>

Janet Navarrette

In the exhilarating journey of starting my own business, I found myself at a crossroads. Armed with a promising idea and the necessary skills, I received a gentle nudge from a friend: Read more>>

Don B

“The Independent Dream Factory “ as a name came pretty easy to my team and I after we broke down what the goal of the company would be. In the beginning, we were 3 independent business owners who benefited from the resources of each other. Read more>>

Laura Ackley

Throughout my time teaching Kindergarten and first grade in a local public school, I became known for incorporating the outdoors into the classroom setting. Read more>>

LaShayla Simpson

The name of my business came unexpectedly and organically, which I feel is the best way for things to happen most times. At the beginning of the pandemic when everything shut down, I started cooking a lot more at home. Read more>>

Chrissy Das

I launched my writing business back in 2015 under the name Content with Chrissy, LLC, and wrote website content, edited books, and was ghostwriting nonfiction topics for business owners. I’ve had a few rebrands as I’ve narrowed down my niche and found my focus. Read more>>

Randi Perez

Creating a name for my small business was definitely not as easy as I was thinking it would be. I went back and forth with different names, looked at other small shops to see how their names came to be, asked family and friends for their opinions. Read more>>

Winona Nelson

The Language of the Lil’wat Nation is called Ucwalmícwts. My Ucwalmiwcts name is t̓eq̓á7el ti qepm̓íc, which means “wing of a swan”. My full legal name is Winona Alessandra Nelson. Read more>>

Shakira Carter

Finding the perfect name for my business was definitely a challenge! I knew that I wanted a catchy name that tied in to the mission of my company and something that would allow me to grow into multiple industries. Read more>>

Farah Severin

I’m of Haitian descent, and growing up my parents instilled a great pride in me for Haiti. I grew up speaking both Haitian Creole and English. Haitian Creole is such a beautiful language; as is the Haitian culture. Read more>>

Luis Martinez

For us 2AMBurrito Productions started out as a joke. Before we even started making movies our group of friends would all get together to out to a bar or club or get together for poker night and on most occasions those evenings would end up at a taco shop around 2AM. Read more>>

Nailah Darby

The bakery’s name was chosen to pay homage to my great grandmother, Carrie Vine. Despite popular belief, she was not necessarily a baker, she was a prominent midwife in the North Area of Charleston, SC. Read more>>

Sarah Hill

I have always enjoyed sharing easy recipes that can be enjoyed by all with most of them taking just around 30 minutes to make. As a nutritionist and even before then, I am a big proponent of developing recipes made with real, whole foods. Read more>>

Kevin Dudley

I’ve always loved photography. The challenge of composition and the beauty of seeing the world through a camera lens while trying to capture what the human eye sees is exhilarating. Read more>>

Alan Avry

Funny story, so as a kid, I grew up in Denver, CO with my mom where she built her own studio in the basement of our home. This was at a time before Home studios were a thing, I mean she really built a real studio in the basement! Read more>>

Rachel DeCavage

I was really struggling with coming up with a clever name, whether or not it should be personal, or practical, and how much it should say about my business. But the whole reason I started a business was to do the things I love to do for those 40 hours a week. Read more>>

Morgan Sumner

My favorite question! Poche Design Studio has some history. Our name means so much to us – we really dug to name ourselves Tobi and I had done the work of defining our company values, defining audience and client profiles, and setting up the bones of our company. Read more>>

Kyle + Izzy Kurczewski

This is such a sweet question with a very special story! The name of our business is closely tied to our story. We met while working at a summer camp back in 2018 working on the media team. Read more>>

Leeza Diehl

The name of my brand Nitro*A*gogo! came from my love of vintage 60’s & 70’s fashion.. particularly knee boots, hot pants, mini skirts & big giant black sunglasses. The GoGo dancer look & street style. Read more>>

Javier Ramirez

Our pizzas are naturally leavened and our wines are natural, so the word was almost too obvious for us to use. Adding the Spanish feminine article in front, which is grammatically incorrect but feels so perfect, was the magic touch. Read more>>

Christopher Claxton

“Something Light” was a phrase I always said when I received a Complement or I was acknowledged for a job well done. I was always taught the importance of humility & I would remain humble even when receiving praise. Read more>>

Carly Stone

The story behind the name of my business came to me pretty easily…growing up in Southern California I’m a total beach girl through and through. I’ve always loved the water and have spent the majority of my life at the beach. Read more>>

Christopher Woll

Downmixing is the process of taking a multi-channel mix, such as 5.1 surround sound or Dolby Atmos, and combining the channels for a two-channel presentation like stereo. It’s a term that is recognized in the audio industry but I also felt had it a ring to the layperson. Read more>>

Giavanna Rosa

When I first started my business in 2020, I actually had a different name; WildCle. I picked that name out for two different reasons; Wild as in my personality and Cle for Clematis as a nod for my Grandpa, his front porch was covered in them… Read more>>

FranCine Gadsden

The saying “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me” is a popular English proverb that conveys the idea that physical injuries caused by sticks and stones (objects) can cause pain and harm, but words, in themselves, cannot inflict the same kind of damage. Read more>>

Arielle Gerke

We have rebranded our business in recent years to showcase both sides of our business from my husband’s specialty in the business and my own. We have worked together for many years and have grown substantially from when we first started our business. Read more>>

Jessica Willingham

I knew I wanted not only a unique name for my company; but something kind of chic and kind of girly that would stand out. I wanted something to represent me. In 2019 is when I decided I wanted to be a business owner. Read more>>

Sara Robinson

My daughters inspire me everyday – so I found it fitting to name my business after them. Noelle Rose was created by using both of their middle names. Read more>>

Holly Cox

It was actually super easy to name my business as October House Vintage because my grandmother, Marian Marso, owned her own shop called October House Antiques in Orchard Park. Read more>>

Christine Winebrenner Irick

Lotus Sojourns was born out of a desire to be connected to self, other cultures, and a community of like-minded women scattered around the world. Read more>>