When It’s Time to Change Your Company Name
As of July 1, 2020, Your Wedding by Lauren officially became The Get Together Events Co.
I get a lot of questions about why we changed our name, how we determined the new name, and when we knew it was the time to make the transition. I’ve answered these questions below in the hopes that you both get to know our new company name and to help others determine when it’s time to change your company name!
WHY WE CHANGED OUR COMPANY NAME.
Your Wedding by Lauren was created out of a request for a website to refer potential future clients to, and the website needed a name. I was never expecting this to be my full-time job or anything more than a way to fund my travel bug. With little expectations, I put little thought into the name of the company. My name is Lauren, I do weddings, but I do coordination only- so it’s YOUR wedding vision, not my wedding vision… ta-da! I think it thought about it for maybe 30 minutes.
So as SOON as I realized that this company was much bigger than a side hobby (3 years ago), I realized the name needed to go for a few reasons:
The team quickly became much more than just myself. So the “by Lauren” no longer fully described our team.
The team does more than weddings! For each potential client that actually reaches out and asks, “do you do more than weddings?” I can only expect about 10 other potential non-wedding clients that didn’t get that far.
Your Wedding by Lauren is the most common, basic, unoriginal name for a wedding and events company ever. If you look at WeddingWire or The Knot, about half of all planners use either “by” “your” or “wedding” in their name. While our services are unique, original, and stand out, our name wasn’t doing that for us.
While determining Your Wedding by Lauren took 30 minutes, finding the new name that was going to encapsulate our team, our services, and our style took about 35,000 times longer.
HOW WE GOT TO THE GET TOGETHER EVENTS CO.
We went through about a million and a half names before landing on The Get Together. Some names got so close we bought the domains (you’re welcome, Squarespace). Some were so close we even started working on logos.
It took three full years of brainstorming, asking for opinions, and going back to the drawing board before I realized that I wasn’t going to get anywhere without professional help. I was too connected, too attached, too invested.
So I buried my pride and I worked with a professional. We went through their idea prompts (who is your ideal client? where do they shop? what are three adjectives that describe your service?) and then let them generate the ideas. The first round wasn’t so hot (BossyPants Events), but then, the second round… it was like lighting.
I read the email: The Get Together.
BOOM BANG YES DONE. It was instantaneously perfect. It was cheeky, it was fun. It was classy while still being quirky. It doesn’t describe a specific aesthetic (since we take on our clients vision) but it does describe what we do (organizing/getting it together) while also describing the arena in which we work (events and get togethers).
And, most importantly, it was available. The website, the social handles (which is truly half the battle), the legal stuff, it was all ours.
So in naming your company, a few takeaways:
Give it time. Sit on it, ruminate on it, go back to the drawing board. When you’ve invested the time, when the right name comes, you will know.
Know what your company is 100% in and out, so if asked a million questions about your companies favorite breakfast food, you could answer them.
Bury your pride and work with a professional. That doesn’t mean you don’t love your company any less.
Websites, social, and legal docs need to be available in all name iterations of your company. (While our main website is TheGetTogetherEvents.com, you better believe we own everything around and like it as well).
WHEN IT’S TIME TO CHANGE YOUR COMPANY NAME.
This one is easy. It’s never a good time. Never!
There will always be hiccups, confusion, annoyances, but you can limit them if you are strategic about your timing. Here are some things to consider:
When is your busy season? Avoid it. Being in the wedding industry, I knew I needed to change the name in our low season, when folks would be able to pay attention to a change. So our choices were either the winter season or July.
Can you get it all done in time? If you are busy up until June 28, you aren’t going to have time to prep for a July 1 launch. You need to make sure you budget out enough time to actually pull the band-aid off and do the damn thing.
When will it confuse your clients the least? In our low season, I have the least amount of clients, so I know I would be confusing the least amount of current clients as possible. I also know that most of my clients for next year book in the winter, during engagement season, so I wanted to change the name far enough in advance so folks know what company they are booking when it came to that time.
But then Covid happened, and now that everything is screwy, my motto is- no better time to shake things up than when things are already shook!
After all that- after the sweat, tears, confusion and frustration, you’ve got a new, beautiful, company name! Thank you for reading along through our process- I hope this has helped you and I hope you continue to follow The Get Together Event Co’s journey!
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Lauren Schaefer is the founder of The Get Together Events Co., a Month-Of wedding and events coordination company, offering affordable services and peace of mind to New York, Nashville, Chicago and beyond.
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