Marketing Dreck?
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In a series of comments on a recent post, Stephen Jones observed that "The Iranians have a detergent called 'Barf'"; and Language Hat explained that "That would be because barf is the Farsi word for 'snow'"; and Merri added this:
Speaking of modified brand names, this is a good place to recall that the washing stuff "Dreft" -a purely arbitrary name- was at first coined as Drek, until somebody at P&G realized that this is the Yiddish word for s**t.
The trouble is, these stories about cross-language branding disasters generally turn out to be urban legends. I dissected one of them a few months ago, dealing with the alleged fate of the Ford Pinto brand in Brazil ("The Factoid Acquisition Device"). And we've discussed a number of other such legends over the years, with the result so that I've come to wonder whether any of the language-related stories that marketing professors tell their students are ever true.
So this morning, purely as an academic exercise, I decided to spend a few minutes looking into the legend of Dreft and Dreck.
Merri didn't invent this story — it's out there, in one version or another, both in the blogosphere and in at least two published books. Thus in a recent blog post ("Today is Cyber Monday. Wait, whaaaaa?" 12/1/2008), we read:
In 2005, the National Retail Federation decided to call the Monday after Thanksgiving “Cyber Monday.” It’s supposed to symbolize a busy day for online retailers and be their promotional equivalent to the brick-and-mortar stores’ Black Friday.
However. The name? Would not have been my first choice.
Didn’t anyone tell the NRF that “cyber” as a verb means “to have cybersex?”
Or did they hire the same marketing consultants who originally gave Procter & Gamble’s “Dreft” detergent the name “Dreck” without realizing that it was a Yiddish word for garbage?
And a comment on a blog post from 4/26/2007 about Yiddish vocabulary, we get a slightly different version of the story, in which Dreck was the name of a follow-up product:
Years ago, Procter & Gamble had success with Drene (shampoo) and Dreft (detergent. So based upon brand recognition, they created Drek. They pulled the name after trying to sell to the first Jewish wholesaler in Chicago.
It's apparently true that P&G introduced Dreft in 1933 and Drene in 1934; but I haven't been able to find any evidence that the company actually marketed or even contemplated a follow-up "Dreck". A joke to this effect must have been independently invented many times from the 1930s onward, and such jokes are often re-interpreted as history.
According to Google Books, the "Dreft-was-originally-Dreck" version of the legend can be found in Charles Merle Crawford and C. Anthony Di Benedetto, New Products Management, 1999, on p. 377. The "snippet view" gives enough information to allow me to reconstruct this passage of advice on choosing a new brand name:
Conduct interviews with users to screen the list down. Ask what the brands on your list mean. This is the stage where P&G caught Dreck (Yiddish and German definitions included garbage and body waste), so it was changed to Dreft. When down to less than 10 candidates, get a legal check on their availability and …
Crawford and Di Benedetto were not the first to tell this story. Google books also turns up a passage in Stephen Birmingham, The Golden Dream: Suburbia in the Seventies, 1978. p. 47. This time I was not able to recover the complete passage, but with in internal ellipsis, it reads:
Advertising plans, layouts, and schedules were drawn up to present Dreck to the American … Hastily, the name of the new soap powder was changed to Dreft.
As far as I tell, though, neither book gives any source for the claim.
The Wikipedia article on Dreft takes the lexicographical influence back in the other direction, asserting that
The term "dreft" has entered the vernacular as a synonym for feces, as newborns tend to produce copious amounts of it.
However, the article offers no evidence for this assertion, and I haven't been able to find any genuine examples of the alleged vernacular usage.
One additional aspect of the situation is indicated by this commercial, said to be from 1937 (for showing in cinemas), which underlines the fact that Dreft was then marketed as a dishwashing detergent. It's not clear to me whether it was simultaneously marketed as a laundry detergent, or if the laundry applications came later.
Anyhow, my verdict on the Dreft/Dreck legend is "not proven". (If you have any evidence to add, please supply it in the comments section — there's no prohibition against double jeopardy for urban legends.) I certainly haven't shown that cross-language marketing stories are always false, but neither have I found that they are ever very often true.
[To avoid any possible offense, let me stipulate there really is an Iranian detergent named "Barf", and LH's explanation of the name is certainly true. But whatever issues this may have raised in other countries, the Paxan company has not felt the need to change its brand.]
Carlos Gómez said,
December 8, 2008 @ 12:16 pm
I don't know if this has already been covered in this blog, but I can point out a similar case which is not a myth: Mitsubishi Pajero has another name (Montero) in Spain, because "pajero" is Spanish for "wanker".
[(myl) There's an extensive discussion of this interesting and relevant case here, from a linguistic point of view. Arnold Zwicky also mentioned it in an earlier LL post, "Automotive naming (and more)", 4/21/2007. I have to confess that this does seem to be a case where a story about a cross-language naming blunder seems to be true, at least linguistically speaking. ]
Merri said,
December 8, 2008 @ 12:18 pm
Well, I got this one from a senior executive at P&G, who had no particular reason to want urban legends about their errors being spread. And that was in the early 80s IIRC. I'm not sure she wants her name being written here, but that sounds like a fairly direct source.
Markus B. said,
December 8, 2008 @ 12:31 pm
The German word "Dreck" can be translated as
a) dirt
b) rubbish/trash
jfruh said,
December 8, 2008 @ 12:37 pm
Aw, next you'll be telling us that Coke (or was it Pepsi?) didn't really enter the Chinese market with a brand name that meant "bird urine", or a marketing slogan that meant "Coke brings your dead ancestors back to life."
Emma said,
December 8, 2008 @ 12:42 pm
I always was uncomfortable with all the Bimbo marketing for bread in Latin countries.
Arnold Zwicky said,
December 8, 2008 @ 12:47 pm
I treated car names (and some others) here back on 4/21/07, in "Automotive naming (and more)":
http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/004430.html
zadig said,
December 8, 2008 @ 12:47 pm
I recall a sandwich chain called Jreck Subs that provided no end of amusement among my Jewish friends (and me once they explained the joke). They've been around for years, though, so the word similarity does not appear to have damaged them.
kip said,
December 8, 2008 @ 1:07 pm
What a ridiculous misuse of language. "Cyber Monday" is no closer to "have-virtual-sex-online Monday" than "Black Friday" is to "African-American Friday". (I'm sure there are many far superior analogies than that one.)
Jan Freeman said,
December 8, 2008 @ 1:09 pm
Another reason for skepticism about the Dreck story might be the abundant German immigrant population in Cincinnati (P&G's home). German dreck ("dirt") is less offensive, I am told, than Yiddish drek, but it would leap out at any German speaker as an inappropriate name for a cleaning product.
@Merri: I've been dubious about word-of-mouth sourcing since a very close friend, an MD, said her own NY hospital had admitted Calvin Klein in the last throes of AIDS … about 25 years ago.
On the other hand, I can attest to the existence of a Barf Bed & Breakfast in England's Lake District, 10 or 15 years ago — and I have the photographic evidence.
Cameron Majidi said,
December 8, 2008 @ 1:09 pm
I haven't set foot in Iran since 1980, but I'm pretty sure I remember that there was a detergent called Barf back in the '70s. The Persian word in question is pronounced with vowel as in TRAP, though, not with the PALM vowel of English barf.
In Iran they never recognized foreign trademarks, so pirated versions of major international brands with slightly altered names were common. My favorite was always the chewing gum labeled "Wrigglers".
Benjamin Zimmer said,
December 8, 2008 @ 2:07 pm
If anyone was wondering about the full quote from the Stephen Birmingham book, here it is (using tried-and-true snippet-outwitting tactics):
[(myl) I bow to your superior snippet fu.]
Mark Liberman said,
December 8, 2008 @ 2:08 pm
jfruh: Aw, next you'll be telling us that Coke (or was it Pepsi?) didn't really enter the Chinese market with a brand name that meant "bird urine", or a marketing slogan that meant "Coke brings your dead ancestors back to life."
For the marketing slogan, see the Snopes page. Money quote:
The Snopes discussion also points out that the specific location (Taiwan? Hong Kong?) has never been clear, nor the specific translated language; and that the same story has been told about the same alleged misunderstanding in other places, such as Thailand and Germany.
As for the "bird urine" part, that one's new to me, and apparently to Google. Can you provide a link, or did you just make it up for fun?
Ray Girvan said,
December 8, 2008 @ 2:13 pm
I always slightly cringe at Unilever's rationalising its UK brand name "Jif" to the international form "Cif".(despite "syph" being still moderately well-known as slang for syphilis).
Jonathan Mayhew said,
December 8, 2008 @ 3:42 pm
I'm wondering about another approach to this. Do people really care whether a name for something is a homophone with a word with negative connotations? Let's imagine this urgan legend:
"Television executives in the 60s almost tried to market a show name 'The Dick Van Dyke Show,' seemingly unaware that the word 'dick' was slang for the male sexual organ."
John means bathroom or customer of a prostitute, but that doesn't bother people named John very much.
Also, branding research shows that people are not necessarily turned off by brand names like "yahoo." Stories about brand names with secret negative meanings are suspect because people, in any case, can easily recontextualize the phonetic material and aren't really bothered by those associations.
David Eddyshaw said,
December 8, 2008 @ 4:11 pm
I remember an item some years ago on BBC radio regarding car number plates, which in the UK as elsewhere have a three-letter component. Disappointingly, several easily pronounceable combinations do not occur, and it was alleged that there are bureaucrats specifically tasked by the Department of Transport with the duty of expunging combinations that might give offence, not only to tender-minded Anglophones, but to speakers of other languages too.
The fearless reporter, in a spirit of enquiry, had decided to investigate the prohibited combinations; while some were obvious, others were not; it was specifically alleged in the programme that one was banned for suggesting a rude word in Serbo-Croat.
This news source is the home of the telepathic parrot story, mind you ….
Stephen Jones said,
December 8, 2008 @ 4:19 pm
I've emailed Mark a photo of Barf detergent so hopefully he'll be able to put it up. Interestingly it was only when a colleague in Saudi showed me the detergent that I found out what 'barf' meant. You lesser mortals may barf, but I puke.
I once had a Mitsubishi Pajero ( a superb example of Australian carmaking). I bought it off the Sri Lankan ambassador in Saudi when the government changed and he got sacked. Lovely vehicle; did sixty thousand kilometers in eight months with it.
It is still the vehicle of choice for the Sri Lankan elite, politicians and gangsters (often the same people). In 89-91 the approach of one would fill you with terror as they were used to disappear suspected JVC insurgents. Nowadays you get disappeared by men in Toyota Hiace white vans, which shows a definite decline in the class of the average government kidnapper.
Meesher said,
December 8, 2008 @ 4:30 pm
Dave Barry claimed that Coca Cola means "bite the wax tadpole" in Chinese, presumably as a spoof of this sort of business school story.
Matt A said,
December 8, 2008 @ 4:45 pm
I very much doubt that this "bite the wax tadpole" thing is true, but I don't think Dave Barry made it up. ke1 蝌 could be said to mean 'tadpole' & la4 蜡 means 'wax.' 可口蝌蜡 ke3 kou3 ke1 la4 could then sorta be said to mean "bite the wax tadpole." This is pretty labored though – I can't imagine anything like this would have actually happened. Something like "咬蜡的蝌蚪" would be a much better way of saying it.
Bob Ladd said,
December 8, 2008 @ 4:48 pm
What I've always wondered about in this connection is why some multinational brands have different names even when there's no obvious taboo to motivate the difference. TJMaxx is called TKMaxx in the UK. Oil of Olay used to be Oil of Ulay in the UK and Oil of Olaz in Germany (maybe we could start an urban legend about that being a typo resulting from the difference between German and QWERTY keyboards…). Wall's ice cream in the UK is Algida in Italy, Langnese in Germany, and probably other things in other countries. But McDonald's is always McDonald's, and Persil bleibt Persil. What motivates these differences?
Martyn Cornell said,
December 8, 2008 @ 4:56 pm
David Eddyshaw: I knew some people who lived in Hertfordshire whose car carried the registration letters KUT, which is very rude indeed in Dutch, something which rather undermines your BBC story … they took their car to Amsterdam and couldn't understand why people kept looking at it and sniggering …
Gordon Campbell said,
December 8, 2008 @ 5:15 pm
Surely this should say 'barf is one of the three dozen Farsi words for snow'.
Alan Farahani said,
December 8, 2008 @ 5:17 pm
Just to follow up on Cameron's comment, when I was in Iran recently I did not see Barf detergent, but it does seem the concept has been exported.
I saw the detergent (http://veritas.nfshost.com/pictures/barf_hayastanum.jpg) in this supermarket (http://veritas.nfshost.com/pictures/express_hayastanum) in Yerevan, Armenia. Since I had heard of its existence from others who had seen in it Persian-speaking countries, I immediately took a picture of it. When I asked a supermarket employee where it came from, he said "I don't know – Iran or Tajikistan". The writing on the side is in several Caucasian languages, so its current iteration may be more localized, or at least the product of smart marketing. I'm not sure — any help here?
Benjamin Zimmer said,
December 8, 2008 @ 5:30 pm
Snopes on "bite the wax tadpole." (Always pays to check Snopes first.)
Chloe said,
December 8, 2008 @ 5:37 pm
My telephone/television/internet provider in Portugal is called Meo (presumably inspired by "meu" – my/mine), which means "I piss/pee" in Spanish. My Spanish friends are most amused and immediately say "me meo de risa".
JS Bangs said,
December 8, 2008 @ 5:39 pm
Am I the only English speaker here who has "dreck" as a perfectly unexceptional item in their English vocabulary? Not until I read this article did I ever hear that the word was a foreign borrowing not known to the majority of the populace.
Daniel Lowbeer said,
December 8, 2008 @ 5:40 pm
My personal (and personally witnessed) favourite is a washing detergent sold in Israel called "Colon". I'm waiting for a follow-up product called "Sphincter".
Bryn LaFollette said,
December 8, 2008 @ 5:50 pm
Some years back I attended a summer linguistics program in Debrecen, Hungary. One of the more popular forms of fast food eateries were these kiosks that sold Hungarian facsimiles of hamburgers (among other things), that were pretty tastey. However what my American and British English speaking friends and I found endlessly amusing was that while they used the loanword "(ham)burger", for the cheeseburger they substituted the Hungarian word of cheese, "sajt", which if you know Hungarian orthographic convention, is pronounced [Sait]. So, you could order a hamburger with sajt or a sajtburger.
jfruh said,
December 8, 2008 @ 5:52 pm
Mark, the bird urine thing was me half (or really one eighth, or worse) rembering Dave Barry's "bite the wax tadpole" story — I'm glad others have a better memory than me on the subject.
Matt A: I think the point is that Coke's first attempt to market itself in China resulted in them just figuring out what Chinese syllables could be mashed together to approximate the sound of "Coca Cola", without regard for what they meant, with the result being the phrase in question. If the story is true, it makes sense that the resulting phrase isn't really grammatical.
Daniel von Brighoff said,
December 8, 2008 @ 6:19 pm
In support of Mr Mayhew's comments, let me mention that one of the major grocery chains in my home town of St Louis is named Schnucks. This often provokes gasps of incredulity followed by sniggers from northeasterners, but to us it was just a name, no more remarkable than that of its rivals Kroger and Dierbergs–and it's not like we're unfamiliar with the Yiddishism "shnook" out here.
Similarly, I was an adult before someone explained to me that the meaning of the slogan "With a name like Smucker's, it has to be good" was that the name was such a handicap that a mediocre product wouldn't have survived. Again, the existence of "shmuck" in my vocabulary was still no obstacle to seeing "Smucker's" as "just a name".
Adrian Morgan said,
December 8, 2008 @ 7:20 pm
Speaking of detergent, I've always been fond of the Australian joke that I first read in a school magazine in the eighties: "Don't Drink Drive. It's a washing detergent".
To JSBangs re: "Not until I read this article did I ever hear that the word was a foreign borrowing not known to the majority of the populace", remember we're talking about the populace of the 1930s, and I wouldn't be surprised if it was an unfamiliar word that far back.
mollymooly said,
December 8, 2008 @ 7:22 pm
As regards Wall's / Algida / Langnese / etc: these were separate national brands gradually bought up by Unilever. The names have been retained but were given a common look, later replaced by the non-verbal Heartbrand, allowing most packing, ad copy, etc to be made and sold transnationally.
Bob Ladd said,
December 8, 2008 @ 7:30 pm
@mollymooly: Thanks, that makes sense. But that presumably doesn't explain TJMaxx and TKMaxx.
Erin O'Connor said,
December 8, 2008 @ 7:30 pm
I think there's more to the problem with "cyber" than it being shorthand for cybersex, but I and some readers did complain about it a couple of years ago: http://kirinqueen.livejournal.com/208417.html
Dan H said,
December 8, 2008 @ 8:02 pm
John Brunner, in his 1968 work Stand on Zanzibar, does the cute sf thing of making up his own expletives so as to avoid using any genuine ones. One of his choices is "dreck", which he has a character explain is short for "whale dreck" and means sperm. As the term doesn't come up in Moby Dick it seems an unlikely story, and the book has enough hypothesized linguistic innovation that I wouldn't believe any of its words' etymologies, but it's an interesting thought, and in light of this post I wonder where Brunner might have heard it before.
Ken Lakritz said,
December 8, 2008 @ 8:35 pm
This entry got me thinking about the great, recently retired, Boston Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling, and his wife Shonda.
Doubtless Ms. Schilling is an admirable person, but for someone with even a smattering of Yiddish her name is unfortunate.
Spectre-7 said,
December 8, 2008 @ 8:39 pm
My brother just told me an amusing story from his time at Creative Labs, a rather large manufacturer of audio products. Seems they were introducing a new product called Oozic (reportedly mingling the words ooze and music… not sure why they thought that was a good idea), and during a meeting, the PR team went over their research and mentioned that the word meant whale penis in Inuit. Of course, they didn't think it would be a problem because the Inuit don't exactly buy a ton of MP3 players.
The company went ahead with the product roll out, and gave the product a rather prominent display at a trade show. Much to my brother's surprise, a man walked up to him during the show with a smirk on his face and said, "You know that means penis in Eskimo, right?"
Lance said,
December 8, 2008 @ 8:44 pm
In general, I think Mr. Mayhew is right—my inner six-year-old giggles every time I hear "Dick Van Dyke", but ultimately it's just a name.
However, I also have a gut reaction against Oreck vacuum cleaners every time I see their logo (and I saw it almost daily when I was dissertating, as there was a vacuum repair shop very near my Cambridge-area coffeeshop of choice). The font makes the capital "O" look enough like a capital "D" that I invariably read it as "Dreck". I can't blame David Oreck for using his own name, and as a Minnesotan he may not have been familiar with Yiddishisms (though I wonder if he ran into it living in New York); but all the same, it's not what I'd have named a company.
Watch Yer Language - Your Monday reading list said,
December 8, 2008 @ 9:52 pm
[…] Language Log digs into "cross-language branding disasters." It's a very enlightening […]
Benjamin Mako Hill said,
December 9, 2008 @ 1:42 am
I've got a page in my userspace on Wikipedia that collects these. You should take a look and add ones you think are good and remove ones you think are dreck. It's pretty great, actually:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Benjamin_Mako_Hill/List_of_unintentionally_offensive_product_names
Alex B said,
December 9, 2008 @ 6:04 am
The only actual example of rebranding to avoid taboo words in the car industry is the Toyota MR2 coupé, which was called just MR in France. Reportedly, this was to avoid the association MR deux – merde/merdeux.
Rachael said,
December 9, 2008 @ 6:18 am
Lance: I find the same thingwith Caffe Nero. It looks like "Caffe Nerd" to me.
Merri said,
December 9, 2008 @ 6:25 am
Another necessary rebranding in the car industry occurred shortly after WW2, when Jaguar shifted from a model name to a company name – it was SS before.
And about MR2 : there is a village in Normandy called Eu. Wonder whether its first citizen has taken any steps to avoid being called Monsieur le Maire d'Eu.
Nigel Greenwood said,
December 9, 2008 @ 7:01 am
@ Merri: I presume you're familiar with the village in Brittany called Merdrignac: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merdrignac
The name of a major Turkish consumer-goods manufacture — Arçelik — seems calculated to raise eyebrows in the UK, at any rate: http://www.arcelik.com.tr
Geoff Nathan said,
December 9, 2008 @ 7:07 am
Here in Detroit there's a car dealership chain (at least for the moment…) called Meade. Again, their choice of font makes the cap-A look remarkably like a cap-R, and I really did double-take the first time they introduced a series of billboards that sure looked like MERDE to me…
Ginger Yellow said,
December 9, 2008 @ 7:21 am
I remember an item some years ago on BBC radio regarding car number plates, which in the UK as elsewhere have a three-letter component. Disappointingly, several easily pronounceable combinations do not occur, and it was alleged that there are bureaucrats specifically tasked by the Department of Transport with the duty of expunging combinations that might give offence, not only to tender-minded Anglophones, but to speakers of other languages too.
I've no idea if this is true, but UK postcodes certainly aren't policed in a similar fashion. My office's postcode ends with 5EX.
Nigel Greenwood said,
December 9, 2008 @ 7:53 am
@ Jonathan Mayhew : Cf the popular double-dactyl:
Hey-nonny, ho-nonny,
Penis Van Lesbian
Entered the bus'ness that
no biz is like.
Keen on increasing his
marketability,
he took on the stage name
of Dick van Dyke.
tim said,
December 9, 2008 @ 8:05 am
this isn't a case of renaming, but the name of the czech car company "Skoda" means "what a pity" – though it is also the founders last name, which isn't an uncommon name.
is it a legend or did the Nova (No va – Spanish=doesn't go) not sell well in Mexico?
[(myl) It's a (false) legend, as Snopes explains. ]
BlueBottle said,
December 9, 2008 @ 8:10 am
@ Bob Ladd: I suspect TJMaxx may have changed their name in the UK to avoid confusion with TJ Hughes, a very similar discount chain already in business in Britain.
ajay said,
December 9, 2008 @ 9:46 am
My personal (and personally witnessed) favourite is a washing detergent sold in Israel called "Colon"
Aimed by its French manufacturers at the settler market?
Kilian Hekhuis said,
December 9, 2008 @ 9:58 am
In the Netherlands, the Fiat model 'Croma' has never sold very well, since 'Croma' is better known as the brand name for a baking butter (and a generic name for any type of baking butter, nowadays). When the Croma model was reintroduced a couple of years ago, Dutch Fiat dealers petitioned Fiat to change the name for the Dutch market, which they refused. I think I have seen one new Fiat Croma drive around here, since the model is an utter fail, unsurprisingly.
Skullturf Q. Beavispants said,
December 9, 2008 @ 1:28 pm
In New Westminster, British Columbia, there's a tattoo parlour called "Dutchman Tattoos" whose sign I always thought looked like it said "Outchman Tattoos".
Debbie said,
December 9, 2008 @ 3:50 pm
I always thought my mother's Oreck vacuum cleaner looks like DRECK in big bold letters.
David Weman said,
December 9, 2008 @ 10:20 pm
"And we've discussed a number of other such legends over the years, with the result so that I've come to wonder whether any of the language-related stories that marketing professors tell their students are ever true."
The Honda Fitta.
Francis Deblauwe said,
December 9, 2008 @ 11:21 pm
Actually, the word invoked by:
*Alex B said,
*December 9, 2008 @ 6:04 am
*
*The only actual example of rebranding to avoid taboo words in the car industry is the *Toyota MR2 coupé, which was called just MR in France. Reportedly, this was to avoid the *association MR deux – merde/merdeux.
It is actually "emmerdeur" (masc.; emmerdeuse fem.) which means something like "asshole."
Regarding the Barf laundry soap: this was also available in Iraq. I know of a picture of a US soldier next to a big sack of Barf (I hope the html comes out OK):
Finally, in Kansas City, Missouri, where I used to live, there was a Chinese restaurant called "Chien Dynasty." Of course, knowing some French I thought this hilarious as chien means "dog" and everybody has heard those urban legends about Chinese restaurants in Europe or the US supposedly serving dog meat…
Francis Deblauwe said,
December 9, 2008 @ 11:23 pm
Nope, the Barf pic didn't show. Well, here's the URL. It is part of a series.
Francis Deblauwe said,
December 9, 2008 @ 11:27 pm
Barf pic, part of series
Colin John said,
December 10, 2008 @ 9:16 am
To tidy up a couple of things raised by earlier commenters.
– Barf is the name of a hill in the English Lake District (probably derived from OE Barrow), so Barf Bed & Breakfast is logical enough. A standing stone on its slopes is known as 'The Bishop of Barf' and is kept painted white by the regualrs at the local pub. I am familiar with the US meaning of 'barf' but it's not part of my vocabulary, though I can't answer for those who are decades younger than I. I don't think I've ever heard it used by a native UK English speaker.
– TKMAXX is alive & flourishing in the UK.
– I'm surprised no-one raised the 2 soft drinks in France, which certainly existed into the 80s. These were named 'Pschitt' and 'Sic'.
– On the subject of hills in the English Lake District; there are a pair called 'Great Cockup' and 'Little Cockup' about 10 miles East of Barf.
Merri said,
December 10, 2008 @ 11:23 am
Another brand name that wouldn't fare well in France : Gerber. It's equivalent in meaning and style to 'to puke'.
vaardvark said,
December 10, 2008 @ 2:37 pm
The Dreft/Drek story sounded decidedly Melbrooksian to me. I couldn't quite figure out why until I remembered that Brooks made jokes on both John (toward the end, when Patrick Stewart pronounces a sentence on Prince John) and Latrine ("It's a good change!") in Robin Hood: Men in Tights (not to mention all sorts of other Yiddish jokes, including, "Feigeleh?–No, we are just friends," which was clearly targeted to a very narrow audience (unlike John and Latrine).
Chukuriuk said,
December 10, 2008 @ 5:25 pm
A decade ago I was spending a lot of time in Ukraine. Cadbury was selling its "Wispa" bar there, and the name was transliterated Vispa. Vispa means "smallpox" in Ukrainian (equivalent to Russian ospa, Ukr. has epenthetic v here and o>i in a closed syllable), as more than one Kievan pointed out to me. I have no idea if this had any effect on sales.
Honda Fitta? Does it really exist? said,
December 11, 2008 @ 4:15 am
I was in Amsterdam for a language course once, along with some Finnish students. During a Culture Walk around town, we stopped by the statue of the Max Havelaar-author, who dubbed himself "Multatuli". The Finnish students all started sniggering, and some burst out laughing when the teacher told us it meant "I suffered much", as it to them meant "I came".
I've seen a bottle of perfume called "Tiss" that I presume still isn't on Norwegian shelves, I don't think anyone would want to smell of urine.
Vibster said,
December 11, 2008 @ 5:44 am
Another example of naming successes that might be disasters outside their planned domain/range: Pocari Sweat and Calpis: two quite popular drink brands in Japan. (One of them is gaggingly pale yellow in color.)
Jarek Weckwerth said,
December 11, 2008 @ 1:03 pm
Let me add my two cents:
(1) Re: Škoda cars and avoiding a cross-language branding problem. I don't know about Czech, but Polish szkoda /ʃkoda/, with the same pronunciation as in Czech, certainly does mean 'what a pity' (and 'damage'). However, Polish Škoda commercials (and Polish people in general) tend to pronounce the name as /skoda/, disregarding the haček diacritic over the first letter, and thus avoiding the homophony. From what I remember from the old-system days (before 1989), when we didn't get any Škoda commercials (or any commercials at all, for that matter, at least on TV), people pronounced the name as /skoda/ even back then. I wonder whether this was a conscious avoidance strategy, or (much more probably) a fortunate case of ignorance of foreign spelling conventions.
(2) Re: refusing to change a brand name despite unwelcome connotations. There's a German brand of light bulbs called Osram. They are readily available in Poland. Despite the fact that the name means 'shit-1sg-fut-perf' (from srać 'shit (v.)'), it hasn't been changed to anything less evocative. There is, however, a joke that utlises the connotation: What hangs from the ceiling and makes threats? – An Osram light bulb.
Why would I want to wash my clothes in THAT?! « Tales From An Open Book said,
January 3, 2009 @ 8:10 am
[…] Urban legends abound when referring to products and translations. There are many items that have claims about their English translations (or translations into other languages), but many of these are just that….urban legends. To read more about this issue, you can visit this link. […]
Liens rapides du 9 février 2009 au 10 février 2009 said,
February 10, 2009 @ 3:19 pm
[…] Language Log » Marketing Dreck? – "The Iranians have a detergent called 'Barf'"; and Language Hat explained that "That would be because barf is the Farsi word for 'snow'" Liens rapides […]
dhritiman said,
July 6, 2009 @ 2:58 am
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jun/30/russia-nigeria-gas-name-blunder
Guardian contains a story about a joint venture company formed between Russia's Gazprom and Nigeria's state oil company which was, rather unfortunately, named NIGAZ.
The Guardian story goes on the repeat the Ford Pinto, Chevrolet Nova, and a couple of similar stories.