Stretch of the imagination

A decade ago, branding was for soap powder and baked beans.

But as we report in our feature section this week, branding - involving everything from names, logos, slogans and ampersands - is today a subject involving hundreds of thousands of pounds of expenditure by major law firms around the country.As the adage goes, the problem with advertising is that at least half of it is a complete waste of time - the difficulty is knowing which half.

The same could arguably be said for branding or image creation.Big budgets are devoted to revamping an image that might not have been a problem in the first place.

But law firms are increasingly aware that they are in a crowded market in which the players appear to be similar.While it is probably impossible to determine whether an advertising or marketing budget is paying dividends, one forecast result of greater freedom for law firms has not been borne out.When the rules on law firm names were liberalised several years ago, it was predicted that the public would be courted by the likes of the 'Wyatt Earp Equine Legal Practice'.

But in reality, solicitors have shown themselves to be more sophisticated - and creative -than that.

Indeed, one could almost argue that the recent decision to pare the names rule down even further is a plea for firms to be even more creative.