Odopod
“When we started Odopod we wanted to create a company with the ideas and resources to execute big and the metabolism and culture to behave small,” said Founder and Creative Director Tim Barber. “So when it came to naming the company we combined two pieces that got at this big/small idea. Odo — this was Godzilla’s island, the island where he had been a legend for generations and where he first came ashore. We loved the bigness and total domination of Godzilla. And Pod [because] at the same time we liked that we were a compact team that grew ideas, like a pod — the compact, protective enclosure of a seed. For the record, Steve Jobs stole our thunder a year later when the iPod launched.”
Zaaz
“We wanted a name that wasn’t an acronym or the founders’ names,” said Shane Atchison, founder and CEO of Zaaz. “So we came up with Zaaz, mainly because it was short, succinct, available. Also it’s a palindrome. We define it as something new, because that’s something we aspire to do every day. There’s no secret meaning behind it, just a made up word.”
+Castro
“We wanted a short, Latin, memorable and, most of all, uncomfortable name,” said Nicolas Pimentel of +Castro, the Buenos Aires shop he founded last year that is already working for Nike and Lay’s potato chips. “The most important thing you have to do if you want to innovate is to be willing to leave the comfort zone constantly. What one thing can constantly remind you of this? The name of your own agency. In a capitalist world, everyone tends to relate the word “Castro” to Fidel. Such a controversial person is a bit uncomfortable.”