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Corporate raiders

Fraser Nelson

Thursday, 28th August 2008

When you hear American television saying “Barack Obama will speak tonight at Invesco” – it conjured up images of some corporate lecture, not a baseball stadium. But Invesco has bought “naming rights” and has been at the forefront of trying to buy the English language. About a decade ago, when I was a financial journalist, I once took a complaint from Invesco. The company was INVESCO, in capitals, they said – so why don’t I comply? I asked them if it was an acronym: nope, they just wanted it to stand out on a page. So I told them to bugger off.

Yet the corporate raiders have been slowly winning their attempt to introduce this idea of “naming rights” – basically instructing journalists to do as they say. Or insert a new word – so “the Premiership” becomes “the Barclays Premiership”. The Times eventually ordered us allow “easyJet” to be written thus, saying companies should be able to choose how write their name. The Millennium Dome is now “the O2”. For years, the Denver Post newspaper resisted the corporate name of Mile High stadium – and explains its struggle here.