Speakers & Topics

Nina Beckhardt

Nina has always preached that “Naming is weird,” and perhaps nowhere is this truer than when hammering out naming engagement contract terms. How can naming practitioners structure their contracts in a way that uniquely serves them? Why do clients always push back on attribution rights? No you cannot own every single name I present!
What started out as Nina shouting into the void evolved into something more productive as the basis for this talk: interviewing in-house and external counsel and biz dev folks to research these questions. This talk will shed light on unique naming contract challenges and provide helpful, actionable legal insights possible to the naming community.
An internationally published and recognized authority on naming and brand innovation with 15 years of experience running global creative agencies, Nina helps corporations and startups create strong, strategic names with ease.
Her agency, The Naming Group has been naming partner to Fortune 500 and 1000s as well as a handful of cool startups. Their work includes naming cars for Chevrolet models Sonic and Trax, to overhauling how Reebok names their footwear. They have led naming for P&G, GM, Target, PUMA, Capital One, EPSON, and Dow Jones. Nina have been published and featured in The Economist, Forbes, Bloomberg , Mashable, CNN.com, Washington Business Journal, WSJ.com, Automobile Magazine, and USA TODAY.

Naming can be a lonely pursuit: hours hunched over books, lost in trademark databases, immersed in languages from all over the world and throughout time. But namers need each other. As our industry, and the demands on us as namers, shift rapidly, leaning on and learning from each other is more important than it’s ever been.
We will imagine what our community could look like, and how we can make naming a better understood and better valued part of business and brand building for the era to come.
Caitlin Barrett is the founder of the naming studio Wild Geese Studio and the naming education platform Naming for Everyone. They have spent nearly 20 years helping brand teams improve the way they name. Previously, Caitlin was a partner at the brand-language studio Doublebit and served as director of verbal identity and global head of naming at Interbrand. They were also a senior writer at Ologie and a copywriter at Martha Stewart, where they got their start naming scented candles, kitchen towels patterns, and, once, a very expensive ham

Naming architecture. Nomenclature systems. Naming systems. Have you heard these phrases? Have you done these projects? And if so, have you figured out where brand architecture ends and naming architecture begins?
Rob ... hasn't.
Or, at least, he's not 100% sure he has. But he's been thinking about naming systems a lot, and is looking forward to sharing what he's learned about what they are (and aren't), why they matter, and how to go about solving a naming system challenge (whether you're a consultant or in-house). Join Rob as he dives into this oft-requested but rarely understood type of naming project.
Rob Meyerson is a brand strategist and namer. He runs Heirloom, authored Brand Naming and co-authored the sixth edition of Designing Brand Identity, and hosts the podcast How Brands Are Built.

Chef Anthony Shore will bring you into his naming kitchen for a behind-the-grinder look at how he makes the sausage, walking you through his favorite tools and techniques for creating new names. He’ll put special focus on the naming tools you probably aren’t using yet, demystifying them and showing how they can add real flavor to your name development projects. This hands-on demo will bring more tasty creative recipes to your book.
Anth will demo for 30 minutes followed by 15 minutes of Q&A.
Mangia!
Like you, Anthony Shore names things. He’s been doing it for 36 years. Anth doesn’t want to see shitty names from anyone, so he gives away all that he knows about naming at his blog at OperativeWords.com.

Senior Naming Strategist
Amazon

“No, I did not make up this job.”
“Yes, I assure you I did think of that option.”
“No, I can’t put that into words, but, yes, I know it’s true.”
“Yes, that is the smell of my previous, soul-level conviction burning off like morning dew at this very moment, the first time anyone with authority has questioned my naming strategy.”
Jeremy’s session will give us a peek into the world of in-house naming. In a house filled with some very smart people. Which means we’ll also get access to the inner monologue of someone who’s spent a lot of time wondering what it means to be the expert in the room, how he keeps getting away with it all, and what any of it has to do with being able to properly spell “impostor.”
Jeremy names things for Amazon from inside Amazon. He and his naming partner Gabriele Zamora form the two-person Naming Strategy team inside Amazon's Devices & Services organization, which brings brands including Kindle, Echo, Ring, Fire TV, and Alexa to customers around the world. Prior to Amazon, he named food, pet, and wellness brands, ingredients, and technologies. His obsession, however, is responding to Instagram requests from fellow potters for names for glazes.

Senior Partner
Lippincott

Lippincott is frequently approached by large, established brands with the existential question: is it time to change our name? It might be driven by reputational issues, limiting perceptions, or the desire to signal a new chapter. And more often than not, inertia wins out. As experts who champion a name's potential to transform, how do we know when to defend the power of continuity vs. the opportunity to evolve? Jake will share how he thinks about the quandary, ways to measure the cost/benefit, keys to overcoming the fear of change and inspiring the ultimate leap of faith required to rename.
The Case for Change
Lippincott is frequently approached by large, established brands with the existential question: is it time to change our name? It might be driven by reputational issues, limiting perceptions, or the desire to signal a new chapter. And more often than not, Jake Hancock has spent his 20-year career focused on naming from solo practice to boutique firms to traditional ad agencies and brand consultancies. As the current head of Lippincott’s global naming practice, he’s developed corporate and product names, naming systems and strategy for dozens of Fortune 500 brands.