What's in a name?

Despite the Law Society's relaxed rules regarding the names of firms, Scott Neilson finds that while mergers create a re-branding flux, the majority of practices prefer traditional epithets

It was only in January that Hammonds finally lost its edge - its Suddards Edge, to be precise.

At the same time, Hobson Audley's courtship of US firm Faegre & Benson ended in marriage.

The merger resulted in a new name that, in a move typical of law firms revising their nomenclature, simply combined the pre-existing names of both firms, although, daringly, they have dropped the ampersand.

Even more recently, US firm Jones Day last month merged with London firm Gouldens to become Jones Day Gouldens - the former having already shortened its name from Jones Day Reavis & Pogue.

However, radical departures from pre-existing law firm names remain relatively rare, despite the 1997 Law Society change of rules that dropped the requirement for firms to include within their titles the name of a past or present partner, following a consultation that received a record 3,000 responses from the profession.

To a large extent, it is now a case of pretty much anything goes.

The Wild Bill Hickok Equine Law Consultancy was the fictitious example used back in 1997 to demonstrate the wide latitude available.

'Since many firms still aren't really that brilliant at marketing themselves, it's not surprising that they've still got a large number of names in their titles,' says Robert Pay of business development consultants Jaffe Associates, a trans-Atlantic company with a strong focus on law firms.

'Hammonds is a good example of a firm that saw the writing on the wall.

They're international now.

And if you're a French or German speaker, "Suddards Edge" isn't exactly going to roll off the tongue,' Mr Pay says.

US firms are, if anything, worse.

Five-name firms are hardly rare - take top Wall Street practice Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom - while a leading Boston firm goes by the moniker Mintz Levin Cohn Ferris Glovsky & Popeo.

At the same time, the US is also home to the appealingly-named Red Hot Law Firm.

One London firm that has enthusiastically taken advantage of the change of rules is employment law specialists Archon.

The firm was originally called Langley & Co, explains senior partner Jill Andrew.

But that name became redundant when the named partner left the firm in 2000.

'The reason we chose Archon is because A, R, and C are the first letters of the last names of the three partners.

We dived into the Oxford English Dictionary and looked at words that began with ARC.

We settled on Archon because it's the name of an Athenian magistrate,' Ms Andrew says.

'The name fitted us perfectly because we wanted to project a modern classic image.

The change also gave us the opportunity to start a re-branding process that is only now coming to an end.'

Another firm that has put aside past convention is Law Direct, the registered trading name of three-partner Chester-based firm White Rose Solicitors.

When David Slingsby set up Law Direct with partner Cameron Robson in 1998, the new business took full advantage of the change of rules simultaneously to play to both regional and national clients.

Mr Slingsby says: 'By working under the name Law Direct, the firm advertises its expertise in personal injury and conveyancing work as far afield as London.

This name de-regionalises that side of our firm, breaking through the geographical boundaries.

And we chose White Rose because it was memorable, presented a strong image and reflected Cameron's Yorkshire background.

'Also, Robson Slingsby would have sounded like just another law firm.

We needed to stand out a lot more than that.'

However, the choice of the populist Law Direct name has been a little too successful.

Mr Slingsby says the name, currently unprotected by the Law Society and too general to trademark, has also been used by at least two other English firms.

Another firm that has been relatively avant-garde in its choice of name is six-partner Stockton-on-Tees commercial law firm The Endeavour Partnership.

A lot of thought went into naming the firm when it was set up more than three years ago, says partner Paul Bury.

'We needed a name that would give us a corporate image.

It needed to be easy to remember and had to encompass the way we intended to work.

And using all of the surnames of the four founding partners would have given us a name that was too long, while using only two could result in lost reputation for those not included,' Mr Bury says.

'The choice of The Endeavour Partnership reflected the way the firm wanted to do business with, and for, its clients and its local roots.

We see ourselves as a firm for business in and around the Teesside area.

Also, Captain Cook sailed from these parts in The Endeavour and our offices are on the river Tees, while there is a replica of his ship on the other bank.

So the name has a local, historical aspect to it as well.'

These three firms are not the only ones to take advantage of the rule change.

Other examples include the London-based media and IT specialists formerly known as Henry Hepworth, which traded in its 'terribly old fashioned and Dickensian' name for the much hipper and punchier H2O brand, while LawWorks in West Sussex has also appeared on the scene since the rule change.

Initials have proven popular - EMW Law in Milton Keynes, Manchester firm JMW and Cardiff's M&A Solicitors (a firm which, unsurprisingly, specialises in mergers and acquisitions), to name just a few.

On a broader scale, PricewaterhouseCoopers' legal arm chose to call itself Landwell across the globe after a costly rebranding exercise that raised some eyebrows for producing a meaningless name.

Also, an Internet search at the time it was launched came up with a Web site called 'Landwell - home of the smooth dachsund'.

Of course, some firms are already memorable enough without having to worry about such changes: Warwickshire firm Wright Hassall and London's Moon Beever, for example.

But almost all of the firms that have renamed have one thing in common.

With few exceptions they are all either new firms or niche firms that have renamed themselves in a bid to project the right image to a certain type of client.

Indeed, six years on, a leisurely browse through the legal directories reveals an overwhelming adherence to traditional names - there has been anything but a stampede to rename by a legion of frustrated practices.

Most of the changes that have occurred have merely been the result of mergers or of simple tidying up, such as Lovells, Linklaters and Salans dropping longer names to reflect what most people already called them, or style changes involving the liberal use of the lower case; Nottingham firm freethcartwright, once Freeth Cartwright Hunt Dickens, is one example.

South-east firm asb law took on both initials and lower case.

But most law firms in England and Wales still include the names of partners, past or present.

Why then, in a profession where firms arguably struggle to stand out from each other in the eyes of the public and in a world where corporate client re-brandings (Consignia, O2, Corus) are two a penny, are lawyers so hesitant to head down the same road?

The answer is simple, says Mr Bury.

When it comes to the issue of nomenclature, law firms are caught in a historical quandary.

The Society's relaxation of the rules has come a century or two too late, he says.

'There are good commercial reasons for established firms not to change their names.

Many older firms have already established their name in the minds of clients and the rest of the public.

If they could turn the clock back they would arguably go for something much stronger and memorable.

But in reality, it would be to their detriment to change a name that is already well known and recognised.

And logistically, changing your name is an expensive business.'

Archon's Ms Andrew agrees: 'Discarding an established name is commercially risky.

We were lucky - we didn't have the historical baggage that comes with much larger and more established firms.

Because we're smaller we can be slightly more nimble and adventurous.'

A case in point occurred in May last year when 200-year-old central London law firm Gregory Rowcliffe & Milners announced that it had decided to change its name.

Henceforth, it would now be known as Gregory Rowcliffe Milners.

Let's just hope they did not spend too much on branding consultants.

Scott Neilson is a freelance journalist