Browse Definitions :

Is that “brand-new” or “bran-new”? And why do we say it, anyway?

Writing for Business

Which is correct?
If you’re designing a ________ data center, green tech should be a priority.
a. brand-new
b. bran-new
c. new


Answer: c.

Explanation:
“Brand” doesn’t add anything to the meaning of “new,” so for formal writing it’s better to avoid it.

The other day, I heard something referred to as “brand new” and suddenly wondered where that expression comes from. The wonderful Word Detective explains that “brand” comes from Old English, in which it meant “fire” or “a torch.” Something that was brand-new would have been something just out of the fires of creation, like a forged sword or a pottery bowl. Shakespeare actually used “fire-new” to mean the same thing in several plays.

“Bran-new” is a common variation on “brand-new,” although it’s usually considered an error. If memory serves, it was used more commonly some years ago but it still appears fairly often online.

Ben Zimmer (@bgzimmer) digs into the history to respond to a reader message on Visual Thesaurus:

It appears that the advice that Dorothy got lo those many years ago was entirely backwards. Brand-new is the historically earlier form, and bran-new arose as a kind of reinterpretation. But that reinterpretation has proved remarkably sturdy over the years, to the extent that some speakers of English (as in Dorothy’s neck of the woods) take it to be the primary form, with brand-new as a mispronunciation/misspelling that ought to be “corrected.”

Ben Zimmer’s post and the Word Detective entry are both full of interesting information, so you probably want to go read them.

Follow me on Twitter @tao_of_grammar

Dig Deeper on Writing for Business

Networking
  • remote infrastructure management

    Remote infrastructure management, or RIM, is a comprehensive approach to handling and overseeing an organization's IT ...

  • port address translation (PAT)

    Port address translation (PAT) is a type of network address translation (NAT) that maps a network's private internal IPv4 ...

  • network fabric

    'Network fabric' is a general term used to describe underlying data network infrastructure as a whole.

Security
  • DNS over HTTPS (DoH)

    DNS over HTTPS (DoH) is a relatively new protocol that encrypts domain name system traffic by passing DNS queries through a ...

  • governance, risk and compliance (GRC)

    Governance, risk and compliance (GRC) refers to an organization's strategy for handling the interdependencies among the following...

  • total risk

    Total risk is an assessment that identifies all the risk factors associated with pursuing a specific course of action.

CIO
  • microtargeting

    Microtargeting (also called micro-niche targeting) is a marketing strategy that uses consumer data and demographics to identify ...

  • business process

    A business process is an activity or set of activities that accomplish a specific organizational goal. Business processes should ...

  • business process improvement (BPI)

    Business process improvement (BPI) is a practice in which enterprise leaders analyze their business processes to identify areas ...

HRSoftware
  • employee onboarding and offboarding

    Employee onboarding involves all the steps needed to get a new employee successfully deployed and productive, while offboarding ...

  • skill-based learning

    Skill-based learning develops students through hands-on practice and real-world application.

  • gamification

    Gamification is a strategy that integrates entertaining and immersive gaming elements into nongame contexts to enhance engagement...

Customer Experience
  • Microsoft Dynamics 365

    Dynamics 365 is a cloud-based portfolio of business applications from Microsoft that are designed to help organizations improve ...

  • Salesforce Commerce Cloud

    Salesforce Commerce Cloud is a cloud-based suite of products that enable e-commerce businesses to set up e-commerce sites, drive ...

  • Salesforce DX

    Salesforce DX, or SFDX, is a set of software development tools that lets developers build, test and ship many kinds of ...

Close