Who is George Douglas Monkey?

Who is George Douglas Monkey?

Who is George Douglas Monkey?

Creating a logo is one of the most excruciating and time-consuming parts of starting a new business.  Getting it right or wrong can make or break a company. It must be clear, unique, memorable, meaningful, and also match the tone of the company.  We went through several iterations of a monkey character before we found THE ONE.  


Our first logo was a clip art we got off the internet back in 2005 and we used photoshop to make a “fancy” label.  Looking at it now, it was a grainy mess.  We tried a mascot-type logo, but the monkey was a little creepy.   I even tried to make a monkey myself with my beginner photoshop skills…and it looked like a radioactive sign, I’m not kidding.  That was the basis for a graphic designer to take over and give us the logo we have today.  He has a mouth making a O shape to mimic breathing in really hard to try and lessen mouth-burn, he has a peanut nose, and he has fiery hair with 6 flames to represent our family members, and we call him George Douglas Monkey.

 

You might ask, why is his name George Douglas? Well, the first time our company was written in the local newspaper, they called me Doug instead of Greg.  They even asked my wife to confirm our names- and I saw her reply- she didn’t call me Doug. This was very upsetting for me, but extremely funny to the rest of my family.  They remembered my many work-related stories about the people at an Indian branch office and how they thought my name was George.  They called me George so often, I just started answering to George on the phone and signing the ends of my emails as George to those people to keep up my rouse. I was even asked if I was Indian- thinking my last name was an Americanized version of Mukherjee. This was so frequent that when I went out to dinner with my family, they called for “George- party of 6” and I actually stood up and started walking to the hostess, but the real George got there before me and saved me the embarrassment.  The funniest part was that my family didn’t follow me, and they got in a good laugh when I turned around and walked back to them.  


I’ve been called many names besides my own- like Geoff and Darius.  OK, Darius IS my middle name, but when getting through security at an airport last year, the security guard returned everyone else’s IDs stating their first names, but not for me- he called me Darius! This, again, caused the entire family to burst out into giggles as we took off our shoes and unloaded our pockets to get through the metal detector.  Having other people call me Doug and George really stuck a nerve with my kids and they constantly remind me and sometimes call me George or Doug just for fun.  


So, this is how our monkey logo/mascot got his name.  The running family joke is that Daddy never gets called his real name.  My initials are GDM, so we thought it fitting for the mascot to have the same initials.  So, George Douglas Monkey it is.  


Greg, George or whatever you want to call me!


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