In the category of Worst Brand Names, I nominate a recent discovery: NUXE.

Meant to be a “beauty brand which would bring together Nature and Luxury”, what we are left with is a rather strange set of associations.

Called Nuxe (pronounced “Nukes” as in “No Nukes”) the name might be better suited for a luxury radiation-sickness treatment.

A brand’s name is one of the most important gateways for a consumer to be attracted to it. It is clear that the creators of this new brand had the right idea in terms of hitting a market segment that is on the rise. Nature and natural products are the New Black, clearly, and luxury always appeals.

But when the two are joined by linguistic fusion, the message goes nuclear.

Browsing through the catalogue (and shielding my eyes from the name and its other forms – Nuxellence and Nuxuriance for example), it seems that they have an interesting range of products, crafted to seduce the most jaded consumer.

Although it may well be that Nuxe chose Nuxe just to attract the attention of the lexically and semantically pedantic among us (i.e., me), I think another few hours in the main reactor might have yielded a result with a lower net particle density.

Just saying.