A Week of WHARRRRGARBL about A Possible Name Change for the BSA

Breathless -- and I mean BREATHLESS -- discussions on Boy Scouts of America-adjacent Facebook forums this morning about a possible name change for the national organization being announced this week (possibly Thursday, as the BSA has a speech scheduled during their national meeting titled "Roadmap Session: Broaden our Appeal and Revitalize Our Brand.")

Is a sweeping name change possible? Those touting this filing at the United States Patent and Trademark Office seem to think so.

But is it likely?

I have my doubts.

First of all, there's Scouts BSA. This name was chosen prior to introducing girls to the BSA in 2019. Do they really need to revitalize the brand this close to this previous announcement?

The "new name" being touted is Scouting America. As some have pointed out, that's already been done, by the BSA itself, back in the 1970s. Or at least something similar was, and it was abandoned shortly after it was announced.

Then in March, the BSA rolled out new scout uniforms. Seems to me if they were planning a name change in May, they might have delayed that rollout to coincide with the new name.

Companies trademark adjacent-sounding names all the time.

I think they're making a lot of noise about this trademark application without really knowing what signal lies therein.

I guess we'll see.