ANNALS OF MARKETING GENIUS:

Siemens retreats over Nazi name (BBC, 5 September, 2002)

German engineering giant Siemens has hastily abandoned plans to register the trademark "Zyklon", the same name as the Zyklon B poison gas used in Nazi extermination camps, BBC News Online has learnt.

A year ago, Bosch Siemens Hausgeraete (BSH), the firm's consumer products joint venture, filed two applications with the US Patent & Trademark Office for the Zyklon name across a range of home products, including gas ovens.

Jewish groups have condemned the move, in particular because Siemens used slave labour during the Nazi period.

Too bad; now they have to abandon that snappy sales slogan: It cooks in Treblink of an eye. Posted by Orrin Judd at September 5, 2002 7:08 PM