Small Business Customer Service Story | When Jonny Became Jommy

Small Business Personalised Engraving Customer Service Story | When Jonny Became Jommy

Every so often in small business customer service, you come across a situation where everything is technically correct, beautifully made, and still somehow completely up for debate. This is one of those stories — involving a lovely Claddagh baby bangle, a very well-behaved workshop, and a script font that developed strong opinions about the name Jonny. What followed was a perfectly reasonable customer concern, a slightly uncooperative lowercase “n”, and a creative workaround that eventually involved the suggestion that we might simply exchange the baby for one called Joan instead.

By Seán – The Ecommerce Guy at Small Biz Clarity

The Case of Jonny, the “n” That Wouldn’t Behave and the Unexpected Joan Solution

Every so often, engraving reminds us that letters have personalities of their own. Some are well-behaved. Some… less so.

This was one of those times.

A customer received a beautiful heritage hallmarked silver Claddagh Baby Bangle engraved with the name Jonny. The bangle itself was exactly as it should be — lovely weight, traditional detailing, and a proper keepsake piece. No complaints there.

The issue was the engraving.

Not the craftsmanship, but the way the script letters behave when they start joining up.

When “Jonny” becomes something else entirely

In this particular script style, the problem sits in the connecting strokes between letters.

With Jonny, the double “n” in the middle doesn’t always separate cleanly. Instead of two distinct “n” shapes, the flowing script tends to overconnect the strokes, which can make the middle of the name visually collapse into something closer to “Jommy”.

And once you see “Jommy”, it’s very difficult to go back to Jonny. The brain just refuses.

To be fair to the customer, that’s exactly what happened — and you can’t really argue with someone’s eyes.

Defence 1: The Del Boy Copperplate Argument

At this point, we fall back on the tried and tested Only Fools & Horses defence of engraving.

As Del Boy might put it, this is “Its not Rooney, it says Rodney, its copperplate writing, innit” — a style where letters are less about strict structure and more about flowing artistic interpretation, flourish, and the occasional optimistic assumption that everyone will just know what it says.

In other words, it’s not wrong. It’s just… written in a way that requires faith, context, and possibly a second look.

Enjoy the original Rooney Copperplate Writing clip on YouTube.

Defence 2: The Joan Solution

Then came the second, more practical (and slightly surreal) solution.

If Jonny in this script turns into Jommy, the problem isn’t the bangle — it’s the letter behaviour.

So the workshop’s suggestion, half serious and half resigned, was simple:

We could always get back to the stork and exchange baby Jonny for one called Joan.

Because interestingly, Joan works perfectly in this script style.

The transition “a” to “n” sits cleanly at the base, meaning the letters don’t overconnect or blur into each other. Everything stays readable, structured, and behaves exactly as it should.

Same font. Same engraver. Same process. Completely different outcome depending on whether the alphabet decides to cooperate and this time you have a suitable baby.

Where we landed

In the end, the customer very sensibly chose a version without engraving, one from our beautiful range of Handmade Hallmarked Silver Claddagh Baby Bangles.

No risk of “Jommy”. No debate over letter behaviour. Just a clean, elegant piece exactly as it came from the workshop.

And somewhere in the background, Jonny, Joan, and a very overconfident lowercase “n” continue to live their separate lives — one slightly more legible than the others.