PhillyInc

PNC Financial Services Group Inc. has jumped hard on the environmental bandwagon, and actually acquired a legal trademark for the name "Green Branch." This is a telling, though perhaps logical, result of environmentalism's new cache in corporate marketing and growth strategies. PNC announced the moniker last week to drive home its claim to have more numerous "certified environmentally friendly buildings than any other company on Earth." The bank said the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office granted its request because, essentially, it's a term few others would commonly use about a bank. At least in environmental terms. Plenty are named for green things (Valley Green Bank in Chestnut Hill, for instance.) Some color themselves green (Citizens Bank, for instance). But PNC went further, even if it couldn't grab the ultimate prize: "Green Bank" is a name already owned by Green Bancorp Inc. of Houston, says the trademark office.

- Thomas Ginsberg