“Sylvan Learning Systems Inc. has something many companies can only dream of — a brand name so well known that most consumers recognize it.
Tomorrow, the Baltimore company starts from scratch.
It will announce that it’s now calling itself Laureate Education Inc., a switch made necessary a year ago when officials sold their familiar tutoring centers and other kindergarten-to-12th-grade businesses to focus on running foreign and online universities. New York-based investment fund Apollo Management LP, the buyer of the tutoring business, got the Sylvan label as part of the deal….
“The first thing you learn is just about everything with a vowel is taken,” said Douglas L. Becker, Laureate’s chairman and chief executive officer.” Brand New Identity: A household name in tutoring, Sylvan had to find a new name to fit its new mission: Laureate, by Jamie Smith Hopkins, Baltimore Sun, May 16, 2004
Well, you could just buy a vowel. This is a good article about renaming, with some nice quotes from other folks in the naming biz (but not Catchword – must speak to PR department about that). Laureate is a good name for them – meaningful, aspirational, a real English word to boot. Good choice!
