Bakuchiol Slip

Ashwagandha Bounce

Patchouli Glow

Gotu Kola Dew

The names are punchy, rhythmic and have something about it that we really really..really liked—the fact that they break some rules.

At Nomencapture™ | Naming Lab we closely watch brand names and these, almost immediately caught our attention. Not only because it is Deepika Padukone's brand, but because the names say a lot more than just indicating ingredients.

So, what is it about the 82°E product names, that excites us?

Let's break down the meanings.

Starting with the main brand name, 82'E

‘Rooted in Indian ethos and global in its outlook’ 82’E is derived from the longitudinal numeral 82’30’’ East.  

82’30’’E is the standard meridian giving us the Indian Standard Time for the otherwise vast country spanning a difference of 2 hours across it’s breadth. As a brand that has set out to take the Indian ways of self-care to the world, the brand name borrows the character from the meridian itself—unifying the idea of an otherwise diverse country in the solutions it provides through it culture and heritage. Read more about their story here.

🔥 // The Product names and their origin:

01 Bakuchiol Slip

The word Bakuchiol is derived from the name 'Babchiol'. It is a chemical compound found in the Babchiol plant, native to India & Sri Lanka. Bakuchiol is a plant-based alternative to retinol that improves skin health and has anti-aging properties

02 Ashwagandha Bounce

Ashwagandha is a herb used in traditional Indian medicine as an adaptogen that helps reduce stress. In sanskrit Ashwa means horse and -gandha means smell. The name refers to the herb having a natural ‘horse-like’ smell.

03 Gotu Kola Dew

Gotu Kola is a medicinal herb that’s known for longevity & skin-healing properties. Gotu Kola in Sinhalese, translates to ‘cone leaf’ and in Sanskrit is called as Mandukaparni, meaning ‘frog leaf’ referring to the resemblence with a frog’s webbed feet.

04 Patchouli Glow

Patchouli is a plant that lends its leaves and stem for various uses. Its oil is widely used for skin-conditions & aromatherapy. Patchouli is a French distortion of Tamil pormanteau term Pachhilai, which in turn comes from pacchai meaning green and  -ilai meaning leaf.

🔥 // Why we love the 82'E names:

The names, at least these four, break 3 brand naming conventions*!

*01

The Convention: Short names are better.

How 82'E breaks it: Every name is at least 4 syllables long.

Our Take: While it is not untrue that shorter names have better recall, but it isn't carved on stone. Sound symbolism of names is real. It is the sound and the effort taken to produce that sound that really impacts our perception and memory of the name.

*02

The Convention: French names for luxury products

How 82'E breaks it: Alphaumeral for the main brand name and Indian names for products.

Our Take: Most luxury products, especially in the cosmetic and fashion industry, cannot do without a French name. You can check. It's been an overt strategy now and it's high time we let it go.

*03

and our favourite—

The Convention: Branding for recall over purpose

How 82'E breaks it: Being ready to break rules in favour of authenticity.

Our Take: It is the era of social media. Everyone, sees everyone. It is very easy to fall into the trap of conventions and taking the safe route of 'what worked earlier' only to become one of the many. Bringing out the authentic voice is the only way a brand can survive in the memories of public.

The problem with all the above conventions is that brands tend to take them as blanket rules which they feel they need to follow. They forget to work for the needs of their audience and their own raison de etre and end up taking a bare-minimum or a common denominator approach.

These are only few but most commonly used brand naming conventions in the arena of Brand Naming.

So, what does this tell us?

We believe the era of Native Branding (as opposed to foreign branding, take a look) is here, an era where we name, build & operate brands the Indian (or the country of origin) way.  

Where brands no more rely on western ideas, inflections and perceptions to flank their identity in the global & more importantly, local arena for better reach or recognition.

Hey Deepika Padukone and team, if you're reading this, we loved the 82E product names.

How about you?

We're Nomencapture.

We're here to explore, create and cherish names, meanwhile continuing to wonder what words do.

‍