How Electric Glue Got Its Name

“Boys, what you do is glue screens together…”

Agency co-founders Nick Kendall and Kevin Brown on the day the agency became fully independent

So… how did the Electric Glue name come about? Well. It’s like this: The idea for the business was born around a table at Piccolino’s in Hedden Street, where co-founders Simon Orpin and Nick Kendall drew a business plan out on a napkin.

Orpin and Kendall began life in partnership with the digital agency agenda21 and their first name for the new agency was AllScreens21.“What were we thinking about?” Orpin laments.

But the name Electric Glue was actually inspired by Sir John Hegarty, the agency’s chairman and creative legend who co-founded BBH.

Electric Glue co-founder Kevin Brown (the founding partner of Motive, BBH’s media arm) recalled that the literal translation of the Chinese term for movies, “dian ying,” was Electric Shadow.

“We all thought that sounded rather cool,” Orpin explains. “But the name was already taken by a London-based film production company.”

The missing piece of the puzzle came from Hegarty, who would later tell them: “Boys, what you do is glue screens together.”

While they fell in love with the name, they are occasionally plagued by being referred to as Electric Blue (a wholly different fish in every way).

Plus, the name gave rise to a serendipitous ending.

Orpin explains: “Electric Blue is a lyric in David Bowie’s aptly titled song Sound and Vision. On re-visiting the restaurant of our birth one day we noticed a blue plaque on the wall of the neighbouring building…. to none other than Ziggy Stardust. So maybe the likeness of Blue and Glue was meant to be, after all.”

This was orginally published as part of a Media Leader feature on agency names. Check it out here.