Brand on the run: there is one thing Obiter likes more than a good rebranding - and that's a bad rebranding. Many a branding consultancy has paid for Caribbean holidays for all its staff thanks to a law firm crossing the threshold.

We fondly recall Gregory Rowcliffe & Milners, which press-released the radical decision to rename itself Gregory Rowcliffe Milners, while City giant Linklaters went through a lengthy period of existential anxiety as it renamed itself about as often as a great train robber on the run. Over a period of about five years it went from Linklaters & Paines to Linklaters, to Linklaters & Alliance, back to Linklaters & Paines to denote the UK member of the alliance, onto Linklaters as the alliance member, before finally ditching the alliance name and, no doubt with a sigh of relief, settling on Linklaters as the name of every member of the alliance.


The problem with these events is that they are often announced with a gravity they scarcely merit. Witness the press release received last week from the curiously named Quastel Avery Midgen, which was announcing the outcome of a strategic review begun a year ago. After the standard guff about how the firm 'continues to make an active contribution to its clients' businesses, meeting the requirements of substantial corporate clients, entrepreneurs and individual private clients' (would they still be in business if they didn't?), we then get to the meat of the announcement. The firm has moved 'to a shortened and more memorable Quastel Midgen'. And a new two-colour logo now goes down the side of the paper too, rather than across the top, a 'vertical visual identity' that reflects 'the feeling of dynamism, confidence and approachability oozing' from the central London practice. Steady on, chaps - you may have spent a year dreaming it up, but it's only a logo. And remember: very few good things 'ooze'.