Combine Chrysler, Fiat, Peugeot and you get Stellantis. Stella-what?

Stella-what?

The new name has puzzled car-industry experts, dealers and customers since its July unveiling. Why not one or several of the group’s brands, like Jeep, Dodge, Alfa Romeo and Maserati?

The name rang like “a product to ease stomach pain," wrote the car columnist for The Australian newspaper. An Automotive News story about the unveiling carried the headline: “Take 2 Stellantis and call me in the morning."

Luis Guzman, based in Austin, Texas, drives a sporty 2016 Chrysler 300S and said he is embarrassed by the name: “I love the car and hate the fact that [Chrysler] is going to be owned by a company called Stellantis."

Fiat Chrysler and PSA said Stellantis draws on the Latin “stello," meaning “to brighten with stars." The Latin root reflects the combined companies’ French and Italian heritage. The name also signifies the “creation of one of the new leaders in the next era of mobility," the companies said.

“Our thought process was really very simple," said Mike Manley, former chief executive of Fiat Chrysler, who will lead the new group’s Americas operations. “We have a stable of some fantastic, storied historic brands. We knew from the beginning that we didn’t want to use those brand names as our corporate name."

Pierre-Olivier Salmon, head of corporate information at PSA, said “We are very, very happy and proud of this name, which already unites us," declining to discuss the name in detail.

“People don’t know what Stellantis is," said Jeremy Beaver, president of Del Grande Dealer Group in California, “but this company has changed its name so many times I don’t think it matters to the average customer."

One advantage to a new name: It avoids disputes about who goes first—something that dogged the 1998 merger of Daimler and Chrysler.

Chrysler’s then-chairman, Robert Eaton, told The Wall Street Journal at the time that the name was the last issue to be discussed before the boards signed off. Daimler’s then-chairman, Jürgen Schrempp, had argued that the names of founders Gottlieb Daimler and Carl Benz had to be first, proposing Daimler-Benz Chrysler. Mr. Eaton countered that Walter P. Chrysler had founded their company and was an American pioneer. His name had to go first: Chrysler Daimler-Benz.

Mr. Schrempp told the Journal at the time that he and Mr. Eaton never considered compromising by creating a name unrelated to their heritage.

For centuries, company names have reflected their founders (Walt Disney Co.), products (Coca-Cola Co.), industries (General Electric Co.) or, sometimes, birthplace (Cisco Systems Inc.).

Fiat Chrysler combines Fiat, which Giovanni Agnelli founded in 1899 as Fabbrica Italiana Automobili Torino, and Chrysler, which Mr. Chrysler founded in 1925. Peugeot was created in 1882 when Armand Peugeot broke from the family’s business making bicycles and coffee grinders to bet on the horseless carriage.

Like baby-naming, company-naming has tracked fashion recently. Hip businesses deploy made-up names (Google), sometimes using a made-up verb (Spotify) or adverb (Wonderly), or a prefix (Uber). Rarely do these names betray what the companies do.

In 2001, Andersen Consulting sparked confusion and hilarity when it renamed itself Accenture—officially a contraction of “Accent on the future." The name became widely recognized.

Mondelez, the name Kraft Foods gave its snacks business in a 2012 spinoff, combined “monde," derived from the Latin for “world," and “delez," a “fanciful expression of ‘delicious,’ " according to executives.

Then-Mondelez board member Nelson Peltz said at a conference the following year that the name “sounds like a disease."

Still, “Mondelez just became accepted after a while," said Erika Troia, senior naming strategist at naming agency PS212. With most new names, she said, “After the initial confusion, it ends up coming to a place of acceptance."

Except when it doesn’t, as with Tronc. When Tribune Publishing Co., owner of newspapers including the Chicago Tribune and the New York Daily News, renamed itself Tronc Inc. in 2016, executives said it was short for Tribune Online Content and a banner for its digital future. Some other people said it sounded like nonsense.

The company became Tribune Publishing again two years later.

“The way that words hit our ears affects what we think of them," Ms. Troia said. “Tronc just has a really unfortunate sound to it."

One reason to invent names is avoiding trademarks. “Finding something that’s protectable and available hasn’t trumped everything, but it has become a major part of the process," Jane Geraghty, Global Chief Executive at Landor & Fitch, a branding agency owned by WPP PLC.

“In the old days we could come up with a relatively short list of names that would fit the story that we wanted to tell," she said. “Now we have to generate thousands of names in the process to find, ultimately, a solution that you’re going to be able to trademark."

The auto industry is going through a rebranding and renaming phase that largely reflects its move to clean electric vehicles. South Korea’s Kia dropped “Motors" from its name last week, saying it was revamping its brand to further its “vision to create sustainable mobility solutions."

General Motors Co. has called its battery company Ultium, prompting Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas to ask GM CEO Mary Barra during a July earnings call: “Why not call the company Ultium, the entire company?" Ms. Barra replied that GM was willing to entertain any idea that benefited shareholders.

As Mr. Manley, who will lead Stellantis’s Americas operations, put it in July: “I have to tell you that the naming of a new company is—there’s no doubt—it’s a process for sure."

There was poetry in Stellantis, he said, “and I’m not a particularly poetic person."

This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text