Names of People, Places, Organisations & Brands

Once you know that names get capital letters, the next step is spotting all the different kinds of name. It's not just people, places, teams, companies and brands all count too.

Why there is more than one kind of name

Most people learn early that their own name takes a capital, and that places like London do too. Where it gets slippery is realising just how many things count as names. A football club has a name. A shop has a name. A festival has a name. A day of the week has a name. All of these are proper nouns, and all of them take a capital, even though they do not feel like "names" in the way Priya or Tom does. Once you start seeing every one of these as a name, the capital letters stop being a mystery and start being a pattern.

The kinds of name that get capitals

• People: Priya, Mr Okafor, Grandad Joe
• Places: Manchester, France, Mount Everest, the Pacific Ocean
• Organisations and teams: the BBC, Liverpool FC, the United Nations
• Brands and products: Nike, PlayStation, Cadbury
• Days, months and festivals: Monday, July, Diwali, Christmas

All of these are the name of one specific person, place or thing, so all of them take a capital. Notice that a general word for the same thing stays lowercase. A team is lowercase, but Liverpool FC is a capital, because that is the team's actual name. A festival is lowercase, but Diwali is a capital.

Watch out, the little joining words

In a longer name, the small joining words (of, the, and) usually stay lowercase, unless they start the name:

• the University of Oxford
• the Houses of Parliament
• The Rolling Stones (here "The" is part of the name, so it is capital)

So do not sprinkle capitals over every word in a long name. The big, meaning-carrying words go up; the little linking words stay small. Writing the University Of Oxford, with a capital Of in the middle, actually looks wrong, even though it feels grander.

Job words: capital only with a name

A job word only gets a capital when it is stuck to a name, working as part of it:

• President Lincoln (title plus name, so capital) becomes the president spoke (just the role, so lowercase)
• Headteacher Mrs Cohen (title plus name) becomes our headteacher is kind (just the role)

The test is simple. Is the job word acting like part of somebody's name right now, or is it just describing what they do? Attached to a name means a capital; describing the role means lowercase.

The tricky edge: brands that became ordinary words

Here is one that surprises people. Some brand names have become so common that we use them as everyday verbs. You might google something, or ask someone to hoover the hall. Those started as the names of companies, Google and Hoover, so when you clearly mean the company or the product, keep the capital: I use Google Maps, we bought a Hoover. But when the word has slipped into being a plain action word for "search online" or "vacuum", many people now write it lowercase. For your schoolwork, the safe and tidy choice is to keep the capital whenever the word is clearly the brand. That way you are never marked wrong.

A second angle: names with small parts inside

Some names are made of more than one word, and it helps to see how the capitals fall. In a place name like Mount Everest or the Pacific Ocean, both of the main words go up, because together they make the name. In a person's name, first name and surname both take a capital: Priya Sharma, Mr Daniel Okafor. Some surnames have small parts joined on, like O'Brien or McDonald, and the letter after the apostrophe or after the Mc usually takes a capital too. If you are ever unsure how somebody spells their own name, the best thing you can do is copy exactly how they write it, on a letter, an email or a school register. Nobody minds you checking; people mind having their name spelled wrong. Copying a name carefully is a mark of good manners as much as good grammar.

Why it matters

Names are everywhere in real writing: the people you mention, the places you have been, the teams you support, the shops you buy from. If you capitalise them correctly, your writing reads as careful and confident. If you miss them, a reader notices at once, because a lowercase london or monday looks like a small stumble even to someone who could not name a single grammar rule. Getting names right is one of the fastest ways to make a piece of writing look properly finished, and it is the kind of thing exam markers spot in a heartbeat.

Quick check

Add the capitals:

1. we cheered for manchester city at wembley.
2. her birthday is in august.
3. he works for google in london.
4. we celebrate christmas and diwali at our school.
5. i asked headteacher mr shah, but the headteacher was busy.
6. my family flew to france on a plane run by british airways.

Answers

1. We cheered for Manchester City at Wembley.
2. Her birthday is in August.
3. He works for Google in London.
4. We celebrate Christmas and Diwali at our school. ("school" stays lowercase, it is not named here)
5. I asked Headteacher Mr Shah, but the headteacher was busy. (capital with the name, lowercase for the plain role)
6. My family flew to France on a plane run by British Airways.

Where next

• Proper Nouns: The Core Rule — the idea all these names are built on.
• Capital When Specific: Mum, North, the Sun — words that flip between capital and lowercase.
• Special Cases: "I", Acronyms, Days — the odd ones out.