ECS, why the fun name?

Since setting up the business I have been asked many times, “Why ECS?”

Well, firstly they are obviously my initials but as the daughter of an Army colonel, I was brought up on the phonetic alphabet. My father has never spelled any word out to me in any way other than using this alphabet and still does – he is 86!

With a surname like Chetwynd Stapylton – a tongue twister with too many ‘y’s’ I Iearnt from an early age to spell it out phonetically. We have had many mishaps, possibly my favourite was a prescription written out to ‘Emma Chitwynd Stapyltoes’.

My issue is compounded by the fact that my real name is ‘Margot Emma’ but I have always been known as Emma. Those of you who were given one name by your parents but called by another all your life will know the challenge. Particularly with autofill on computers – when booking a plane ticket, I have often booked in the name of Margot (to match my passport) and discovered – too late – that it has autocorrected to Emma. This has proved costly to say the least. The other problem is that Margot is often read out literally and I then become ‘Maggot’. This happened a lot when travelling for work, so colleagues called me Maggot!

When setting up this business, I wanted to use my name, as it is unusual and well-remembered, so useful when renewing contacts and talking to people. But I couldn’t face the endless ‘How do you spell that?’ so thought it would make sense to use the phonetic alphabet and Echo Charlie Sierra was born.

Amusingly, now I have to ask people to spell it out in full when taking the company details and not just use ECS. It appears I am destined to forever spell out my name… 😊