I have Edward Scissorhands to thank for my passion. Not the Hollywood movie - but a backstreet Amsterdam barbers by the same name.
Having flown from Leeds-Bradford to the Dutch capital without having had time for that all-important holiday haircut I stumbled across a barber's which was to be my saviour (yes, it is run by a man called Edward).
What a relief to come across a barber, and what luck to find one that wasn't known by one of the hackneyed High Street names such as Cut Above The Rest or The Parting Shot. And so a love affair with all things good, bad and ugly in business names began.
My love of names stemmed from my initial career as a news reporter in Yorkshire . I made mental notes of names that made me giggle; names that lent themselves or not to the person's job.
Those who remember Mrs Million working as a bank cashier at Barclays in Headingley, Leeds in the late 1980s may concur. I still cringe when I remember dealing with an elderly care nurse called Mrs Coffin. And I still find it hard containing my amusement today when I see Chief Supt Trotter, head of British Transport Police, or Grand National-winning jockey Tony Dobbin on the news. And what about a couple of weeks ago in the engagements' column one Dr Bypass.
But it is those business names that show inspiration, humour, adventurous thinking and dare I say it downright silliness that now feed my passion. And I try to support them whenever I can.
Above all else, children's shoe shops figure most prominently as they try to stay one step ahead quite literally of the opposition, especially in the face of the growing popularity of footwear sales via the internet..
Favourites include Footsie 100 and Little Toe Peep, while those Adam Ant fans may like to step back in the time to the 1980s and shop at Goody Two Shoes. Others with a musical persuasion may decide that Shoo-be-doo or Shoewaddywaddy is for them.
Children's shoe shops lend themselves particularly well to the business pun such as Lillifoot; Look Who's Walking and Bubble and Chic.
The key back to school' buying period is also the basis for some owners Well School and Shooligans among those jumping on this bandwagon.
Don't let geography put you off anybody in Northamptonshire with a shoe shop would also find it difficult to resist copying the owners who called their shop Towcester Toes, a great play on words.
Perhaps we should have a competition to find the UK 's best shop name? Entries from different sectors could fight it out with rivals to see who would be crowned King of the Pun.
The shoe shops would be up there with the best of them the fish shop called Battersea Cods' Home; the florists Floral and Hardy; the hairdressers Barber Blacksheep; the roadside caf Only Fools and Sauces; or the Baguette Me Not sandwich shop.
While many of the names raise a smile, not least with me, there is clearly a very serious side to naming your business. If you look around, all good businesses have good names.
Being different and being seen to be different is increasingly becoming a fundamental part of building a better business.
The fastest-growing companies, on and off the High Street, are those which differentiate themselves from their rivals making sure they stand out in their market, however fiercely competitive it may be.
Not just on paper, but in practice, too. And that means on the sign above your shop front, or the nameplate on the front door of your business.
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