It’s been said that a name has the power to make or break a company’s success. It’s a business’s opportunity to make a fiery first impression; make a bad one, and it can result in a lukewarm response from clients, investors and other stakeholders. Especially in such a highly competitive and forward-facing industry like real estate and construction, it can often take more than great services to stand out from the pack – adorning a powerful name can be the X factor that gets a company noticed. Numerous companies fall prey to making their names too long, too wordy, too confusing or too generic. Others simply opt for the path of least imagination: take the endless stream of startups with names ending in ‘-ify’ or ‘-ly’, for example. The first iterations were novel and fresh, but the next few hundred? Not so much. 

Of all the queries we receive from clients, potential leads, investors and passers-by, one of the most common is the story behind our name. We know it’s not typical for a property business or startup, but we reckon it suits us perfectly. 

You see, we do things a bit differently at Milk Chocolate. When we first launched, we knew we wanted to create a service and tech company that was a little more unconventional, so naturally we needed a name that reflected our ethos. Eleven or so years ago, Richie and I tossed a few ideas around before putting the strongest contenders down on paper. Then, we lined them up on the floor in front of us to make the final call. Milk Chocolate was the only name that stuck.

We viewed the combination of the two words as a mix of life’s necessities (Milk, or in our case, housing) and fun (Chocolate). At the time, it allowed us to differentiate ourselves in a sea of other real estate and construction businesses and turn away from the convention of using the founders’ surnames or a spin on property-centric terminology. Particularly when we were travelling overseas to market ourselves to Australian expats, we needed something that set us apart from some of the dodgy property investment firms that unfortunately exist. 

Now, the name still goes a long way in supporting our core philosophy, our branding, and our personalities. It reflects our uniqueness in the market: our business model that effectively makes us an all-encompassing property business. It shows that we’re different and a little bit cheeky. It means people remember us and talk about us; even if they’re questioning our naming choice, at least the name is creating a conversation. And that conversation might eventually make its way to potential clients or investors. Despite being given the opportunity to change our name multiple times in the years since Milk Chocolate’s launch, the myriad reasons why it works for us continue to affirm our initial decision. In fact, after a lengthy process, the Milk Chocolate name became a registered trademark in Australia earlier this year – a move that only demonstrates that the name is very much here to stay.

Call us brash, but we look forward to the day when Milk Chocolate is practically synonymous with property – in the same way hoover, taser, bubble wrap and jet ski have superseded the brands that created them, and the name of a certain search engine has now become an everyday verb. We want people to look at a house or building and call it a ‘Milk Chocolate property’ because it has all the hallmarks of what our name and company stand for: it’s unique, it’s memorable, it’s worth talking about, and it marks a much-needed departure from tradition.

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