By admin 
Fans and owners alike, especially in Boston, bring a stronger passion for sports than for a new soft drink or brand of jeans.
And we all know the impact emotions can have on reasoning.
“Sports owners. . . they sometimes skip those protocols, those very disciplined steps to come up with a name,” says John Fisher, senior lecturer in the marketing department at Boston College’s Carroll School of Management. “They almost do it backwards. They give it a name and try to reinvent its identity, consumer value proposition and personality. And I think that caught this new women’s soccer team off guard.”
Fisher was keen to say that he was not criticizing the name, but expressing his personal opinion, an opinion that stems from 33 years at Saucony (15 as CEO) and 17 years as a brand management teacher at BC.
“Who am I to say that?” Visser said. “I’m not the owners, nor am I the agency, which I’m sure has a lot smarter people than me, but it sounds like they were the focus group and what they believed was the brand identity.”
The owners’ explanation for the choice came from Colossus Creative’s research conducted among fans and sports industry professionals, which found that the name should encompass qualities such as strength, creativity, championship mentality and pride in Boston and Boston sports.
The result was “BOS Nation FC.”
As the owners explained, “BOS” has a double meaning that plays into the Logan Airport call letters and the “boss” attitude the team will exude.
That, along with the anagram of “Bostonian” in “BOS Nation,” is “very nuanced,” Fisher said.
“Strong brands make a connection with their consumers, and after they make that connection, it is then up to them to communicate a clear benefit,” Fisher said. “So if the new women’s soccer team wants its brand to take its rightful place among all sporting options, professional and collegiate, here in the New England region, I’m not sure they have done that.”
Asked about the general tone of the feedback – as of October 27 a change.org petition The search for a name change had 1,804 signatories – and as to whether the team is considering going back to the drawing board, BOS Nation FC representatives sent a statement to the Globe:
“We are actively listening to feedback after the launch of (the name). Our brand is built on unity and inclusivity wrapped in a championship mentality, and we greatly appreciate the input from everyone who is passionate about the club and bringing the NWSL back to Boston.”
There is a recent example of an NWSL team changing its mind on a name.
When the Louisville (Ky.) team unveiled its name in late 2019, the response to “Proof Louisville FC” — “proof” referring to the state’s bourbon and spirits heritage — was disappointing. A petition for a name change on change.org, similar to the one in Boston, caught fire. Eight months later, the name was changed to the current “Racing Louisville FC,” a sportier nod to the Kentucky Derby and the state’s horse racing culture.
After the six founding teams of the Professional Women’s Hockey League played their first season using only city names, the PWHL announced last month that it had chosen names for the teams.
In addition to ensuring that each name was legal and proprietary, the competition followed three criteria: Does the name capture the soul of a city and inspire a place of honor? Will the name resonate with fans? Will the visual identity of the name come to life in the community and arena?
Boston’s team became the Boston Fleetwith a deep green top showing a forward-leaning, anchor-shaped “B” with wavy lines filling the shape of the letter.
The PWHL explained the concepts behind the Boston Fleet’s new logo.Thanks to the PWHL
Kanan Bhatt-Shah, PWHL vice president of brand and marketing and a graduate of Boston University, explained at the unveiling that the league wanted to combine Boston’s maritime heritage with the “spirit of Bostonians and New Englanders, this resilience, this unity, this togetherness and that spirit.”
When the Red Sox’ Triple A team moved to Worcester in 2020 after 48 years in Pawtucket, RI, Worcester officials informed baseball owners that they wanted the team to become the Worcester Red Sox.
That left the team scrambling for a nickname for a team best known as the “PawSox” for nearly half a century.
Considering that the Boston Herald first greeted news of the move in 2018 with the headline “WooSox” on the back page, the team had a head start thanks to “an initial media nomination,” said Dr. Charles Steinberg, president of the team. “Would we be the ‘WooSox’? Those who enjoy a quibble would say, “You should be the ‘WorSox,’” and then other variations that just seemed to take time, maybe in a bar.”
Steinberg noted that how a team name sounds is just as important as the way the name reads and what the emblem looks like.
“Lyrically, ‘WorSox’ was a little contradictory,” Steinberg said. “There’s an old expression, ‘it’s kind of part of it’, and that’s important in language in general and in sports communications in particular because the name will be central to your brand.”
So, Steinberg said, “We called on our future fans to say, ‘What would you like the nickname to be?’ ”
More than a thousand responses yielded 218 names, which the team then tried on as many people as possible in Worcester, including students, seniors and Little Leaguers.
No clear favorite emerged, Steinberg said, “but to be cute, no one has beaten the WooSox.”
Chad Tracy (center) is the manager of the Worcester Red Sox.Barry Chin/Globe Staff
The guiding naming principle for the WooSox owners, a group led by Steinberg’s longtime professional partner Larry Lucchino, was: “the better you know your market, the better you get to know your market and the more the market feels part of not just the process, but also the name. , at.
“It’s not that there’s any genius in ‘WooSox’, but ‘WooSox’ was embraced by the market, and the idea of inventing something that would be embraced by the entire market really appealed to us,” Steinberg said. “We weren’t looking for a niche market, we didn’t want to be edgy and smart so much as healthy and fully embraced.”
Does “BOS Nation FC” meet all points?
“It’s not for me to say, it’s too new,” Steinberg said. “We get it, and time will tell how well it is appreciated.”
The change, or non-change, of a sports team’s name has a long history across the continent.
The omission of racist and offensive names and logos by teams such as MLB Cleveland Guardians (of the Indians, who was dumped along with their Chief Wahoo mascot) and the The NFL’s Washington Commanders (from Redskins) attracted a lot of attention when the transitions took place in 2021 and 2022.
Some names are holdovers from a franchise’s past.
Both NBA franchises from Los Angeles kept their team names after moving to the city – the Lakers moved from Minneapolis, the land of 10,000 lakes, before the 1960-61 season, while the Clippers were named after the sailing culture in San Diego, where they played. 1978-1984.
Likewise, there isn’t as much jazz in Utah as there is in New Orleans, the former home of the NBA team, and the population of Grizzlies in Memphis is zero, unlike the bears that roam near the team’s former home in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Utah has an NHL team this seasonthanks to the Coyotes’ move from Arizona. And while there are a lot of coyotes in Utah, the team wants its own identity and is willing to wait for the right one.
This season it will play under the temporary name “Utah Hockey Club” while an online poll is conducted where fans can vote on a selection of 20 names.
The team will use the results to guide their selection in the final decision on the original brand name.
Michael Silverman can be reached at [email protected].