Naming Your Restaurant

In this post we discuss a few of the higher level concepts, some logic, and branding points, to give you a clear picture of what direction to go in when naming your restaurant.

It might help to know that I have named a restaurant (and several other businesses), and it is a success. Also, I work with over 100 businesses, and over a dozen different restaurants on a weekly basis, and while I can’t tell you exactly what to name your restaurant, I can tell you how important a name is, what matters more than the name, and what NOT to do, with confidence.

First let’s go with the obvious, don’t make it sound like it tastes bad.

I mean, don’t do something that sounds like it stinks or it’s gross. It sounds obvious, but you’d be surprised how easy it is to go with a name like “pig feet”, or “stinky’s BBQ”, or something like that. Don’t do that.

Next, the “Caveman Test”.

Make sure it’s something a caveman could read and understand. Moe’s is a great example. Burger King, Chick-Fila, Pizza Hut, these are great examples. Simpler is better. Why? Because it tells what it is, and it’s easy to brand.

You want your brand to go straight into the long term memory, subconscious area of the brain. Young children who can’t read can see a logo and repeat the name of the business if the branding is good, that’s what you want. Not because you necessarily want children to know your brand, but because if a child can remember it, then it’s definitely easy to remember.

Authenticity.

If you have a vision for a gourmet hot dog fast casual concept, then name it accordingly. Stay true to the vision. One of the key concepts to branding is to differentiate WITHIN the parameters of the industry. In other words, use the colors and concepts that people already associate with your industry, but stand out within them. This applies to naming. A bad name for a gourmet hot dog fast casual would be something like “the hot dog shack”, this says the opposite of gourmet, and when you combine shack with hot dog, you get a name that doesn’t sound like it would taste very good. Stay authentic, something gourmet, and “fancy”. Maybe something like “Lucy’s Gourmet Hot Dogs”. Lucy is a pretty sounding name, sounds like lace, and you could do a nice script font, with long tall letters for the name lucy. Another idea for a gourmet hot dog stand might be “international hot dog house”, and play on the million ways you can make a hot dog, pulling on the implications that you can get a french style, a german style, an arabic style, mexican, etc.

Once you have a name, branding is the very next step. Rarely does someone have the skillset to launch a restaurant, be a head chef, run the restaurant, and brand the restaurant, all in 1 person. If you find yourself trying to wear all those hats, consider how important branding is, and hire that out.

I hope this gives you some food for thought. Feel free to take advantage of our free consulting for this kind of thing, we’re available as a free resource to you.

-Chuck

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(714) 312-1214