ABSTRACT
This statement is not entirely accurate, as in reality it was not Leifur Eiriksson who named the country; it was Hrafna-Flóki around the year 860. But does it have some truth in it? The population of Iceland is around 300 000. This puts the country in a group with the least populated countries in the world; yet, despite its small size, it is a rich country that enjoys high standards of living. The name of Iceland is likely to have affected the country in some way, either positively or negatively. It is a fact that many people associate Iceland with the stereotype of ‘ice and cold’, which is not a true or balanced picture of contemporary Iceland. The name might, though, work in favour for some industries according to Baldvin Jónsson, an Icelandic marketing specialist working on the US market: ‘Iceland is a good name. The name of the country is good, both for tourism and for food production. Cold and fresh,’ (Morgunblaðið, 26 June 2005). Iceland does not generally get much attention from the outside world.
However, at the end of 2006, the Icelandic government decided to allow whale-hunting to start again, despite warnings about possible hostile reaction to this in the rest of the world. The negative reactions have been considerable. For example, one of the negative reactions was that the General Manager of the Whole Food Market chain in the USA, Kenneth J. Meyer, sent a declaration to the Icelandic Minister of Fisheries, Einar K. Guðfinnsson, in December 2006, in which he declared that the stores had decided not to put any emphasis on Iceland in their marketing strategy for the Icelandic products sold in their stores. It was thought that the resumption of whale-hunting had had a negative influence and that the goodwill that the customers had for the Whole Food Market stores could be damaged (Fréttablaðið, 8 December 2006). The Chairman of the Iceland Chamber of Commerce, Mr Erlendur Hjaltason, has also concluded
