Whatchamacallit

[type of name]
company

[project story]
whatchamacallit was born at canter's deli on fairfax avenue in los angeles. maybe that's why in our first promotional piece we said that finding a good name is about as easy as finding a good pastrami sandwich.

the company was a spinoff from altman + manley, the ad agency and design company based in boston and san francisco.

my partner, bob manley, and i were killing some time before a flight and we started writing down all the naming projects we had done for our clients. when we were done, there were 40 projects on the table. we decided to spin it out as a separate business and whatchamacallit was up and running.

it was a cut and dried, so-many-names-for-so-much-money kind of business. and eventually it got folded into a hundred monkeys because clients would always ask us things like, can you help us with strategy?" "can you create an image for us?" "can you do our web site?"

so the naming is our trojan horse. it's the first encounter that many people have with us, and then, six months later, we're still there building stuff.

p.s. whatchamacallit is also a top notch candy bar if you haven't tried it.

[credits]
design: tim clark