The Pressure Of A Name

Coming up with names for things has never been something that I have been good at. Unfortunately, I recently realized that I have to name lots of things from documents I create, to new drinks, to new food items, to new projects, and now to a new business. Luckily, my partner tends to have a natural affinity to the creative process of naming something. She has solicited people's input, researched words online, dreamt of new words to the English language, and even badgered me enough to cough up a couple attempts.

Since November, we have spent countless hours labouring over a name that we could mutually agree upon. Last count, we had close to a thousand possibilities. Tucker and I are really different. In many ways, I believe that any success of our business has come from our ability to combine our differences. Over the years, we have learned from each other and most days, working together seems to get easier and better. Sometimes, though, we still get stuck on how different our minds work.

Looking for something new, when you have something that is so great right in front of you, is never easy. Most of us are quite happy to keep what we have. Some have even asked, "Why fix something that's not broken?" So, why not just call our new cafe: Diesel Cafe? It's true that brand recognition plays a large role in the success of a business. And it is true that in the past eight years, we have worked hard to develop a name for Diesel Cafe. But what is maybe more true is that we never want to feel like a chain and technically it only takes two stores to become a chain. We want each location to feel unique on its own right and part of that comes from a name.

Opening a new store is not just opening a second location, but starting a new business from scratch. The creation of a new business is exciting because it is like a blank slate. We have more experience and more confidence, but we are getting another chance to give birth to and nurture something totally new. While George Foreman might be ok naming all of his kids the same name, we are hoping that our creations will be unique and stand on their own.

One of the concepts that Tucker and I continue(d) to overlap on was the idea of connection/ meeting spaces. So much of what we have done at Diesel revolves around the community that has been created within. We wanted a word that could reflect that. We both were attracted to the word "union" both for its relevance in geography but also in meaning. Unfortunately, Union Square is saturated with Union Fill-In-The-Blank businesses. So the objective became to up with a like word that was something other than "union." Surprisingly, we found common ground on the word "bloc." By definition, bloc means: "a combination of persons, groups, or nations forming a unit with a common interest or purpose." This seemed perfect in concept, so agreed. We also agreed that calling it simply Bloc Cafe sounded a little hard or lacking in some way, so we kept searching. We decided to add the word/number "Eleven/11" into the mix for several reasons. We thought it had a nice ring. It is also my favorite number. As luck would have it, 11 is our address on Bow Street. And lastly, it is the number of years that Tucker and I have known each other. From that, Bloc 11 was born.

We look forward to seeing what is in store for Bloc 11.