Five Famous Name Origins

Wendy’s: The first “Wendy’s Old Fashioned Hamburgers” was opened on November 15, 1969; the restaurant being named after the fourth child, Melinda Lou Thomas, of founder Dave Thomas (who incidentally was a high school dropout and before founding Wendy’s helped stop Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) from going out of business.) You might be asking yourself, “How do you get ‘Wendy’ out of Melinda Lou Thomas?” This was a nickname given to her as she couldn’t pronounce her own name when she was young, instead she would say “Wenda”, which is how she got the nickname “Wendy”.

Arby’s: Although some people believe that the enunciation of Arby’s stands for “roast beef”, this isn’t true. It actually comes from the initials of its founders, the Raffel Brothers (R.B.’s). They originally planned to name their company “Big Tex”, but someone already owned the rights to that name.

eBay: The company was originally supposed to be “Echo Bay Technology Group”, but the domain “EchoBay.com” was already taken, so they shortened it and got eBay.com, which was available.

Starbucks: Not many companies dive into the world of fiction literature to find inspiration for their brand, but Starbucks is not just any company. Its name comes from a character in the story of Moby Dick.

Nintendo: This famous company name comes from the Japanese name “Nintendou”. Roughly translated “Nin” means “entrusted” and “ten-dou” means “heaven”, so basically “leave luck to heaven”. If this seems a strange name/slogan for a company, perhaps it’s important to note it started out as a playing card making company in 1889.

Where's the Beef

This week in 1984 marked the beginning of a new commercial for Wendy's. Clara Peller was first seen by TV viewers in the famous and successful commercial campaign for Wendy’s fast-food chain.

Dave Thomas spent $8 million on the ads that promoted hamburger sales plus T-shirts, baseball caps, records, greeting cards and many other items bearing her picture and the famous question. I think the new ads with the real Wendy are boring, but I really do like the new fries they are now selling.

Fast Food Surprise

Many of us suffer the guilty (not me) pleasures of enjoying fast food. Some try to make up for it by buying the wonderfully healthy salads that have been added to the menus for those trying to watch diets. However, many fail to watch the real facts. For men, you can feel vindicated that meat is better for us.

Wendy's Mandarin Chicken Salad has more fat, sugar, carbs, and total calories than a quarter pound Wendy's Double Stack cheeseburger. No wonder they taste so good.

McDonald's Double Cheeseburger has less calories, less sugar, less sodium  as the Asian Chicken Salad w/Crispy Chicken and Newman's Own (Low Fat) Sesame Ginger Dressing.

Taco Bell Fiesta Taco Salad has more calories, more carbs, more sugar more fat than a chicken grilled stuffed burrito.

Wendy's Garden Sensations Mandarin Chicken Salad has more sugar than 8 ounce Coke.

Burger King's Tendercrisp salad has 210 more calories than a Whopper Jr.