The Weirdest Rebrandings Of All-Time​

Weight Watchers

"Weight Watchers abbreviated their name down to 'WW' and in doing so, increased the syllables needed to pronounce their new company name."

~ hambone10

"You burn more calories uttering the extra syllables."

~ jungl3j1m

waitr

"Waitr was an extremely successful delivery service here. They had full time employees and you could get food delivered in 30-45 minutes."

"Then, they made everybody an independent contractor and started calling themselves ASAP."

"'As slow as possible' caught on and they lost the majority market share within a month."

~ bravesgeek

HBO

"I still don’t understand HBO dropping probably the most prestigious name in cable tv/streaming."

~ stoneman9284

"Right?! Also it literally means Home Box Office - that’s the best name for a streaming service????"

~ oreos_in_milk

Nordic Choice Hotels

"Nordic Choice Hotels rebranded to 'Strawberry'."

"They have to mention their old name all the time, because Strawberry could be absolutely anything."

"If only it were 'Strawberry Hotels' but it's not. It's just Strawberry."

"They removed the part that explains what kind of business it is."

"Madness."

~ WoodSheepClayWheat

USWest

"USWest-->Qwest-->CenturyLink-->Lumen I don’t care what your name is."

"Can I have more than 10mbps DSL at my address?"

~ Trickycoolj

"In Europe, and it's now Level3--> Centurylink--> Lumen--> Colt."

"I'm sure they rename in the hope people forget the incompetence."

~ ConsciousValence

"My mom has worked for them since 1977 when they were Northwestern Bell."

"She's been through a billion name changes."

~ CorporalBB

Circuit City IQ Crew

"Circuit City rebranding their PC technician division from IQ Crew (which predated Geek Squad, by the way) to..."

"Firedog."

"I worked at a Circuit City from 2005-2008 and we all thought it was a prank when we saw the announcement."

"'The intensity of fire with the loyalty of man's best friend'."

"I sh*t you not—that was the marketing."

~ Tiberius_Jim

British Petroleum

"When after a major oil spill, BP changed their branding to Beyond Petroleum for an ad campaign showing how they were investing in renewables."

"Logo change too."

~ RandomAmuserNew

"An oil spilled followed by a huge effort to cover it up, including dumping Corexit into the water to mix with the oil and make it sink."

"So it was no longer visible from aerial shots, but it did far, far more damage mixed with a dangerous chemical and sitting on the sea floor than slowly evaporating or being soaked up on the surface."

~ LurkerOrHydralisk

Amoco

"When BP purchased Amoco, they quickly rebranded all the stations to BP."

"Not sure if it is everywhere but Amoco had a lot of brand recognition in the Midwest and a lot of people just didn’t like BP."

"Eventually, they started rebranding some of their stations back to Amoco to cash in on nostalgia."

"I always thought it was dumb but never realized that so many people hated it until after I worked for BP (very briefly) and was told the story of how much pushback they got."

~ anitabelle

Overstock.com

"Overstock.com I think qualifies for weird rebrand."

"Bed Bath and Beyond went out of business and was bought out by Overstock and then Overstock just rebranded everything to Bed Bath and Beyond."

"If you go to overstock.com it’s just BBB."

~ WhatsABuckland

Snoop Dogg

"When Snoop Dogg (temporarily) changed his name to Snoop Lion to make a reggae album."

~ RomanOnARiver

"Snoop’s original name on Death Row was 'Snoop Doggy Dogg'. When he left Death Row and went to No Limit, he had to alter his name (which might have been his original name) to 'Snoop Dogg'."

~ GotMoFans

"Snoop’s mother used to call him Snoopy as a nickname which is the origin."

~ OpanaMan

"The Charles Schulz people would have had a field day."

~ GotMoFans

Books-A-Million

"Books-A-Million to 'BAM'."

"I was in a parking lot with one and had no idea it was a bookstore, as I was a bit too far out to see more than 'BAM' from where I was parked."

~ lynnyfox

KIA

"Everytime I see the new KIA logo I assume its a NIN [Nine Inch Nails] fan."

~ vinyalwhl

"I thought it was KN for an embarrassingly long time."

~ VulfSki

"KIA changed their logo on their cars and Google showed an uptick in the searches for 'K N cars' because people liked the look of them but didn’t realise it was a KIA."

~ User_Deleted_Content

Royal Mail

"Royal Mail deciding Consignia was the way to go forwards."

~ PonITdude

"They wanted to go international but they lost so much money that year they had to stay national and reversed the name back."

~ ShinyHead0

Twitter

"Twitter to X."

~ sandiercy

"And then everyone still refers to it as Twitter."

~ Safety_Drance

"'A user on X, formerly known as Twitter, posted…'.”

~ tommyk1210

"Rather like to see 'A user on Twitter, erroneously known as X, posted...'."

~ SagittaryX

"'A user on twitter, largely unknown as X, posted...'."

~ Pinksters

"A few days ago, I saw an article that said 'Twitter, which Elon Musk incorrectly thinks is called X for some reason...'."

"That was pretty funny."

~ temalyen

City Landmarks

"In Chicago we still call it the Sears Tower [renamed Willis Tower in 2009]."

~ baccus83

"And in Pittsburgh, it’s still Heinz Field [renamed Acrisure Stadium in 2022]."

~ NoVaBurgher

"And in Toronto, it’s still the Skydome [renamed Rogers Centre in 2005]."

~ nonanarchist

"And in New York when you take 287 across the Hudson it's still the Tappan Zee Bridge [renamed Governor Mario M. Cuomo Bridge in 2017]. "

~ keytarin

"A lot of LA people still call it Staples Center [renamed Crypto.com Arena in 2021]."

~ New_Simple_4531

"In Denver we will always say Mile High Stadium [renamed Empower Field at Mile High in 2019]."

~ SheBrokeHerCoccyx

Some rebrandings make perfect sense to the public.

Others are utterly baffling.

What would you add to this list?