62 Times Companies Wanted To Rebrand But It Was An Actual Disaster

Candlestick Park. An icon in the Bay Area and loved by all Giants and Niners fans. Gets bought and renamed 3Com Park.

I felt insulted by it.

Two that I feel are equal due to the effects.

Books-A-Million to 'BAM'. I was in a parking lot with one and had no idea it was a bookstore, as I was a bit too far out to see more than 'BAM' from where I was parked.

Hot Topic focusing on being more fandom. Specifically getting rid of that gothic arch entryway so many had. I lost count of how many people lamented Hot Topic being closed -because- they were looking for that arch.

Instead of displaying the Union Jack, British Airways covered its aircraft tails with dozens of designs inspired by cultures around the world. The idea celebrated global travel, but many people felt Britain’s national airline had erased one of its strongest symbols. Even then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher publicly criticized the change, and the airline eventually restored the traditional tail design.

Tropicana; removing the famous red-white straw directly into the orange imagery for...an unbranded clear glass of orange juice in a generic-looking (white-labeled-looking) package.

Overstock.com I think qualifies for weird rebrand. Bed Bath and Beyond went out of business and was bought out by Overstock and then Overstock just rebranded everything to Bed Bath and Beyond. If you go to overstock.com it’s just BBB.

RadioShack. For decades, RadioShack was where people went for electronics parts, cables, and gadgets. Hoping to attract a younger crowd, the company even rebranded many stores as “The Shack” in 2009. The new nickname generated attention, but it couldn’t solve the bigger problem: shoppers had already found easier places to buy electronics.

This whole Kellogg thing happening now. Having the snacks fall under the new ‘Kellanova’ brand is so dumb I had to see if Musk recently bought the company and came up with the idea.

You guys make cereal and snacks - it will never be some amazing innovative world changing tech company. You aren’t ‘disrupting’ anything other than your own production and marketing costs. So stop trying to act like it to grow your stock price.

That time Netflix tried to break off its DVD rental service into a separate brand called Qwikster. It lasted maybe 3 weeks before they dropped the idea because customers hated it.

Buy.com got bought up and was changed to rakuten. Then they had to have commercials explaining how to pronounce and spell rakuten.

Marriott Rewards to Marriott Bonvoy…… you know the Hotel loyalty program that REWARDS you for frequent night stays.

Sometimes the biggest question after a rebrand is surprisingly simple: what is it supposed to be? Uber replaced its familiar “U” with an abstract symbol that confused users and designers alike. The company spent months explaining the new identity before eventually abandoning it just a few years later in favor of a much cleaner logo.

HBO Go -> HBO Max -> Max.

TonyzTone:

I get that they basically did away with the CineMax brand, and given their ownership by Warner Bros. and a whole bunch of other assets, they wanted to combine and show something new.

Basically anything owned by Warner Bros is on MAX, especially all of the HBO properties. Combining makes sense.

But why not just stick with HBOMax? That was such a solid name.

Land Rover dropping “Land Rover” and kinda going with just JLR (Short for Jaguar/Land Rover) but also only referring to each of their vehicles by name only, ex: Discovery, Defender, Range Rover.

I still don’t know if I explained that correctly because it’s that confusing and galactically stupid.

JCPenney. Customers constantly claimed they hated coupons and endless sales. JCPenney decided to believe them. The retailer replaced discounts with simple everyday pricing, expecting shoppers to appreciate the honesty. Instead, many stopped coming altogether because hunting for bargains had become part of the shopping experience.

BlackBerry. Can a comeback arrive too late? BlackBerry certainly tried. The company launched new smartphones, adopted the BlackBerry name across the business, and introduced an entirely new operating system. Unfortunately, by then the smartphone market had already shifted, and customers had largely moved on to iPhone and Android devices.

Kodak saw digital photography coming and even helped develop some of the earliest digital camera technology. However, the company failed to adapt quickly enough as traditional film sales declined. In the end, having the technology wasn’t enough without changing the business around it.

Waitr was an extremely successful delivery service here. They had full time employees and you could get food delivered in 30-45 minutes. Then, they made everybody an independent contractor and started calling themselves ASAP. "As slow as possible" caught on and they lost what the majority market share within a month.

Any time a corporation takes over the naming rights to a stadium or skyscraper that already exists. They don’t seem to realize that culturally the original name is permanently backed in and they’re spend 8 or 9 figures on branding that isn’t going to work

I’m in Chicago and there’s plenty of examples

The Sears Tower (once the tallest building in the world) was renamed as the Willis tower. No it wasn’t, unless you’re from out of town and just don’t know any better

The White Sox play at Comiskey Park, not US Cellular or.. I think it’s Guaranteed Rate these days? Nah it’s Comiskey, always will be

There’s an amphitheater out in the suburbs that gets its name changed every few years. I can’t remember what it is currently. I know it’s not the Tweeter Center anymore cause it isn’t 1999 anymore but everyone just calls it “the amphitheater in Tinley Park”

If rebranding a stadium or whatever EVER works, it must take decades — like I’ll give it to the United Center; no one calls it the Chicago stadium anymore.

Circuit City rebranding their PC technician division from IQ Crew (which predated Geek Squad, by the way) to...

Firedog.

I worked at a CC from 2005-2008 and we all thought it was a prank when we saw the announcement. "The intensity of fire with the loyalty of man's best friend." I kid you not, that was the marketing.

USWest->Qwest->CenturyLink->Lumen
I don’t care what your name is can I have more than 10mbps DSL at my address?

ConsciousValence:

In Europe, and it's now Level3 -> Centurylink -> Lumen -> Colt. I'm sure they rename in the hope people forget the incompetence