I love wordplay. I wouldn’t call myself a master, but dilettante? Sure. So one thing I enjoyed observing in Paris was how the French employ multi-layered and even multilingual wordplay to create product and business names. This shop was on our way to the bus:
Took me two days to figure it out: Harry Cover? Well, if you pronounce it with a French accent, it’s haricots verts, or green beans. Great name for a produce shop, and the figues were delicious.
Then there’s my kids’ favorite non-patisserie snack – Pom’Potes. Where do I begin? Well, there’s pomme, which means apple, compote which is the same in English, and pote, which is slang for “pal.” Put it all together and you get a name that’s cute and catchy.
Not a play on words, but a product name in which my daughters reveled? Pschitt, a light and refreshing lemon-lime soda. Click on that link and you’ll see that its makers realize what an entertaining name it is too.