Perspectives: Brands and Bands Change Names Under Pressure

As tens of millions of people worldwide have taken to the streets over the past six weeks to pronounce that Black lives matter, corporate America has been nudged into action. But instead of marching alongside protesters, it’s eyeing its own shelves.

Quaker Oats spoke up first, announcing in June that Aunt Jemima, the name and face of the brand’s syrup and pancake mix for more than 130 years, would be no more. The company said in a statement that “while work has been done over the years to update the...

An interfaith coalition is pressing the world’s largest brewer to remove the name of a Hindu god from a popular beer that dates to the late 1800s — a dispute the beermaker insists is a case of mistaken identity.

The group, which includes representatives of the Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, Hindu and Jain religions, is calling on Belgium-based brewing giant Anheuser-Busch InBev SA/NV to rename its Brahma line, a favorite in Brazil.

Brahma was first produced in 1888 by Companhia Cervejaria Brahma, a Brazilian brewery now owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev, whose...