And the nominations are…

‘Of course we still have to come up with a name…’

This, it turns out, was one of those statements that was a massive underestimation of the task at hand. A bit like

‘Rebuild Iraq? Sure, how hard can it be?’

or

‘Well, we made it to the South Pole. Now we just have to get home…’

Ok, so maybe comparing naming a new beer with a national rebirth or extreme exploration is overstating the case (just a tad), but at times it doesn’t feel like it. This is roughly how the process works:

1 - Choose name

2 - Run it past business partner. Binned - Go to 1. Thumbs up from other 50% of Untapped - Go to 3.

3 - Run it through business search. Already used - Go to 1. Name available - Go to 4.

4 - Run it past other half. Binned - Go to 1. Lukewarm approval - Go to 5.

5 - Run it past friends and family. Confused look / laughter - Go to 1. ‘Yeah, I’d order that’ - Go to 6.

6 - Check for any hidden meaning. Turns out name is a synonym for poison in Hindi - Go to 1. All clear - Go to 7.

7 - Last run through google. Name has just been used by monster producer for their latest alcopop - Go to 1. Still unused - Go to 8.

8 - Send name and ideas to designer. Start process again with label design.

Luckily, after going round and round with the latest name, it came down to a very simple conversation with an Untapped fan.

‘What’s the beer?’

‘A pale ale.’

‘Why so complicated? Why not call it Untapped Pale Ale?’

(Pause as thesaurus, lists of descriptive nouns, names scrawled on Tesco receipts are put down)

‘That works.’

Ultimately, you can start to bounce off the inside of your own head with names. You begin to understand that names like Railtrack, or having Jackson Pollock redesign the tail fins of your planes, aren’t creative decisions so much as desperate cries for help.

So, Untapped Pale Ale it is (U.P.A. to its friends). And, although the naming might have been painful, the beer is a delight. Wonderful fruit aromas, with a lovely, deep flavour and a rounded, long finish. This beer is only going to get better as the weather gets warmer.

Oh, and for the unnamed fan who suggested ‘ Sunny Delight’. See number 3 above.
And you’re barred.

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