Years ago I had a client that came to me with the super green vision of creating a futuristic multi-state recycling center. They had secured $300M in funding and purchased several miles of property along a major railroad spur that served a five state area and ran through a small town in a county that bordered Memphis TN.

They had extensive plans laid out that accounted for separating each type of material from ferromagnetic and non-magnetic metals to colored and non-colored glass, tires and rubber, several types of plastics and various other materials.

All material would be separated mechanically by an automated process and broken down into base materials that would be resold. A less than 1% minimal residue would be left over after the separation process and this material would be buried in a landfill with extensive environmental precautions taken to prevent material leaching into the environment.

You really couldn’t ask for a better green solution to the ever-increasing landfills that served the area. This firm even had proposed purchasing the raw landfill from other landfills to mine and recycle the metal, glass, paper and plastics – effectively reducing the landfill across a five state area.

The firm had created a boon for local business, with agreements in place with large firms willing to bring jobs to the area and build factories near the recycling center that would buy the recycled materials at a fraction of the cost of purchasing virgin material.

What was the firms’ name? Profill was historically in the landfill business, and had a solid reputation. The firm’s lawyers moved ahead with their paperwork to secure the proper local and state permits and begin work registered under the Profill name. Management thought they would have several years until the doors opened to come up with the firm’s final name, branding and marketing.

However, local residents who knew nothing about the firm became spooked by newspaper articles with a firm named Profill coming to town, and visions of a giant landfill in their back yard caused a massive local backlash that went all the way to the state capital fighting this horror of horrors. No one wanted a five state landfill in their back yard, and neighbors petitioned everyone they could find touting the pollution, the stench and the hazardous dumping they feared would all come to their backyard.

Profill was 99% recycling and 1% landfill, but they never got to tell their story to the public. Their name said “Professional Landfill,” and that was all the neighbors needed to hear to make up their minds. Profill was a promise to the community to become the green recycling model of the country, to drive a huge influx of jobs and to clean up the landfills of a multi state area, all the while becoming one of the largest recycled raw material exporters in the nation.

Poor branding changed all of that. The dream of a world-class green recycling center would never be. Had the firm started off with a new brand name that reflected the positive nature of a best-in-class green recycling and environmentally friendly firm, all would be better off today.

The takeaway is for any business is this; get your branding and marketing right before you start. Creating a business first and branding it later on can be massively expensive or kill you like it did Profill.

Aflac was founded in 1955, and spent four decades struggling with a name that customers could not remember or pronounce. Prior to 2000, just 1 in 10 people in the United States were familiar with the insurance company.

But in 2000, that all changed. Aflac introduced its new duck mascot to help customers pronounce and remember their name, and today, nine out of 10 people know the Aflac brand.

If you’d like to get off on the right foot with your branding efforts, give us a call. We’ve successfully done this a time or two and have helped originate a dozen or so global brands from scratch that today lead their category in sales.

There’s no time like the New Year to start maximizing your sales efforts.