The Daily Grill

Name Calling

(This article appeared in Canada's Marketing Magazine's September issue.)

By Alicia Androich

Marc Hershon’s e-mail signature reads “From the creators of BlackBerry, Swiffer, Pentium, OnStar, Dasani and Outback.” No, his company didn’t create these products, but it did craft an invaluable component of their success: their names.
 
The sole focus of Lexicon Branding, the Sausalito, Calif .-based company where Hershon is a creative associate, is making up brand names. He spoke with Marketing about how he got his simply kick-ass day job.

Where did you go to school?
The College of Marin, which is a junior college in Kentfield, Calif. I was trying to get a broadcasting degree. I ended up getting a job in radio before I got the degree, so I stopped going.

How did you get from radio to creating names for products?
It was a fairly circuitous route; after radio I got into producing live comedy shows. I met David Placek, the president and founder of Lexicon Branding, at a social function in the late ’80s. I came on full-time in 1993.

So what’s your process for coming up with product names?
We use a method of divergent thinking where we work on naming something that isn’t the actual product. For instance, if we had an assignment to name a new red wine from Italy, we might tell our people that they’re naming a new upscale Italian restaurant. If people start focusing on what the actual product is, tunnel vision crops up very quickly and you stop being expansive.

Also, I’m always on the lookout for fresh resources. I found this gigantic Navajo/English dictionary in a record store. A project came along and I started looking through it for inspiration. It was a fresh source of letters put together in a different way and that’s where the Dasani [purified water] name came from.

We also have a network of over 70 linguists around the world. We want to make sure a name doesn’t mean something bad in another language. About 15 years ago, Reebok came out with a women’s running shoe called the Incubus. It was on the market for less than a week when someone told them an incubus is a demon that rapes women in their sleep.

How many projects do you work on at a time?
Ten is pretty typical. Sometimes more, sometimes less.

How can you tell you’ve got a winning name?
Sometimes you get lucky, you go, “Wow, that’s a great name” early on in the process. The BlackBerry name, for instance, came up in the very first briefing session we had with Research In Motion. But it took an eight-week process and literally thousands of names and consumer research and legal clearance to finally have BlackBerry emerge as one of a dozen names that the company could pick from.

What’s it like to get a name passed through the legal clearance process?
It’s difficult, particularly internationally. One of the hardest things we have to do is present names to clients and say “Do not fall in love with any of these” because as sure as anything, the one they fall in love with is not going to make it through legal clearance.

What’s your typical workday like?
My day is almost completely just thinking of names. So it’s okay for me to leave the office, go for a drive, go to a museum, go buy a bunch of magazines and sit in the park. When you’re able to get away from walls and ringing phones, your thoughts have a chance to really fly.

What’s the biggest misconception about your job?
That it’s easy! I often have friends ask me, “Can you help us name our new baby?” It’s like “Well, no... you’re not going to like me after I show you 30 names you’ve never seen before for your child!”

Succotash Epi11: We've Hit Our Tweens!

Back to basics with Episode 11 of Succotash, meaning we've got a full boat of comedy podcast clips in store this time around and no special guests. Unless you count my impromptu discussion with legendary announcer Bill Heywatt. That happens. We also play our very first message that's come in on the Succotash Hotline. The only message, actually. At least so far.

The biggest news on the Succotash front is that we've just joined up with the Comedy channel on Stitcher SmartRadio! If you're not hip to Stitcher yet, it allows you to listen to your favorite shows directly from your iPhone, Android Phone, BlackBerry or Palm phones. If you don't have Stitcher yet,  you can download it for free today at Stitcher.com or from your favorite app store. (If you're already used to listening to us on our website or download us from iTunes or grabbing it from our RSS feed, all that remains the same - Stitcher is just another way to pass the Succotash!)

We've been getting some nice kudos from a few of the podcasters out there (not to mention our fabulous listeners), so thanks! We don't think of ourselves as competition - we're really just trying to spread the word about podcasting in general and to let folks hear some samples of the programming that's available on the internet. So for those comedy podcasters that want to have us feature them on a future episode of Succotash, the Comedy Podcast Podcast, just shoot us a 3-5 minutes MP3 clip from a recent 'sode - send it along to [email protected] and we'll do the rest.

Here's what's up in Epi11:

•Affirmation Nation

Can't seem to get enough of Bob Ducca, Seth Morris' brilliant sad sack self-help health guru! In this clip, we get a peek inside Bob's medicine cabinet. You can catch him five days a week over at Earwolf, the comedy podcast portal that has recently been dubbed THE podcast place to be over at FunnyOrDie! Bob tweets, too!

• Superego

Another new favorite of mine is Superego. Fast-paced and very funny, these guys have several screws loose and a bunch of Hollywood-based guests to boot. Mostly improvised, beautifully produced, and with a shorthand language all their own, I make a comparison on the show to Superego being the 21st century's answer to the fabulous Firesign Theater. In addition to their homesite and iTunes, also catch Superego on Stitcher SmartRadio.

• Delicious Mediocrity

Hosts Derek Sheen and Douglas Gale are back for a replay on Succotash, this time with guest comedian Ahamefule J. Oulo (whose name I horribly mangle in my intro - sorry!) I have a warm spot in my heart for these guys, as they hail from the Northwest, where I did time a long, long time ago in a comedy club far, far away in Seattle. Check 'em on their homesite and iTunes.

• FATinee Podcast

First time in the Succotash for Joe Hammer and Dan Heinz. These guys are heavyweights (literally) in the movie biz and they split their time talking about pop culture matters, review movies AND previews (in a segment featured here called "Trailer Trash"), and they bust each other's ball occasionally, too. Get the big bucket o' popcorn for this one. Check 'em out on iTunes, Stitcher and their tweets, too.

• The Moth
Sometimes it's not all about comedy. At least at The Moth. This is more like the NPR of podcasts. True spoken word performances, with subjects all over the map. Because Succotash is about comedy, we feature a story from writer Peter Hyman performed at one of The Moth's StorySLAMS. Catch their refreshing honesty at their homesite and on iTunes.

• Sportsaholix
I was turned onto comedians Jon Schieszer and Erik Marino by friend-of-the-show Dave Nelson over on the Comedy-A-Go-Go podcast. While sports is not my bag, these guys are funny as they cover the wide world of them like a blanket. A funny, irreverent blanket. In the clip on the show, they're joined by national headliner Steve Byrne. Homesite and iTunes are the places to catch these boys.

• Uhh Yeah Dude
"America Through The Eyes Of Two American Americans" is the tagline for this show featuring Seth Romatelli and Jonathan Larroquette. Long-running (290 epi's and counting!!!), UYD is a simple formula: Seth and Jonathan talking about pop culture and news of the day, ripped from today's headlines. In our segment, they talk about competing fat women. Find them at their homesite and at iTunes.

• Burst O' Durst
Intrepid politicomic Will Durst checks in for his regular slot, this time dredging up the new-old theory of Trickle Up Economics being exhibited by our elected leadership. Make his homeside a regular stop or click on his name to get over to his tweetstream.

To get even more of the Succotash experience, please hop over and Like us at our page on Facebook. Follow us on Twitter. Rate n' review us at iTunes. And don't forget that we're now also available for instant listening on Stitcher SmartRadio!

We'd love to hear from you to get your suggestions for comedy podcasts to feature on the show. Or maybe your comments and commentary about your favorite shows. Call into our Succotash Hotline any time, day or night - voicemail is standing by at (818) 921-7212.

That's about it for now. Thanks as always to Super Producer Joe Paulino and Musical Director Scott Carvey. Until next time, please remember to pass the Succotash!

— Marc Hershon

 

Succotash Epi10: Dana & Scott Carvey @ Studio P!

WARNING: Episode 10 is not our typical 'sode. (Actually, I 'm not sure - in the first 10 episodes of our podcast - that we have anything that can be pointed to as "typical".) Anyway, what I mean is that this edition of Succotash, The Comedy Podcast Podcast, has no comedy podcast clips in it.

Dana and Scott Carvey sharing memories at Studio P

It does, however, offer something you're not going to find anywhere else in Podcastland: A visit with comedian Dana Carvey and his brother, Scott Carvey, who also happens to be Succotash's musical director. For the first time in podcast history, the Carvey boys sit down and talk about their love of sports, running, music, comedy...and anything else that this free-ranging discussion happened to hit upon.

I think this show represents a true "find" for the comedy aficionado, comedy nerd, Carvey fan and anyone else who enjoys a one-of-a-kind experience. (Special thanks this week to our Engineer/Producer Joe Paulino for doing a bangup job in editing this weeks offering!)

Although we don't have any podcast clips featured this show, we do have our regular feature, our Burst O' Durst with political comedian extraordinaire Will Durst. Then we'll be back to a full rack of comedy podcast clips in our next edition, Epi11, along with Durst, and commercials from our sponsor, Henderson's Pants.

In the meantime, if you have a question, comment or suggestion, please hit up our Tweet Sack via @SucctotashShow or [email protected]; or you can dial into our Succotash Hotline: (800) 921-7212.

— Marc Hershon

Chillin' With The Chillpak Boys!

Big treat this week: I'm the special guest aboard Epi225 of Chillpak Hollywood Hour! Co-hosts Dean Haglund and Phil Leirness were featured as OUR guests back in Epi4 of Succotash, and we've played a couple of clips from their show before as well. It seems turnabout is fair play and during a recent trip to LA to interview Kelly Carlin (currently featured on Epi9), the Chillpak guys asked if I'd join them for an upcoming Labor Day episode.

Quite a thrill for me, as CHH was one of the first podcasts which I began to listen to on a regular basis. Having just celebrated their 4th year of podcasting goodness, I dubbed Dean and Phil "podcasting royalty". Although their focus is Hollywood — not so much celebrities and gossip so much as the nuts n' bolts of films, filmmakers and filmaking — they are fun and funny guys (Dean being not only an accomplished actor but also an improvisor and standup comedian), thus maintaining their eligibility to be featured on Succotash, the Comedy Podcast Podcast.

As I only reveal bits of my history and interests as time allows on Succotash, giving Epi224 of CHH a play will let OUR listeners know a little bit more about the host of this show. At the same time, it's an example of how a freewheeling, funny discussion can come off pretty easily among three guys just sitting around and chatting. I'd like to encourage our loyal Succotashians to hop on over to either ChillpakHollywood.com or to iTunes and not only listen but subscribe to Chillpak Hollywood Hour.

Please pass not only the Succotash but also the Chillpak!

— Marc Hershon