Toronto firm 6S doesn't want to share name with new iPhone

A Toronto company is going to great lengths to persuade Apple to not name its new phone iPhone 6S to avoid name confusion.

The California tech giant unveils its next iteration of the iPhone next week. The naming conventions for iPhones have included an "S" after the number of some models, such as 5S.

"Please call it the iPhone 7," reads a billboard mounted on a truck 6S Marketing parked in front of Apple's Manhattan store on Fifth Avenue for an hour this week.

6S Marketing, founded in 2000 with offices in New York, Vancouver and Toronto, wrote a letter to Apple before taking its message to the street.

"We're super excited about the upcoming launch of your next iPhone, and have heard the rumours that you're calling it the iPhone 6S. We would like to urge you to reconsider," the letter addressed to Apple reads.

"Hopefully this message will reach you in time and you'll reconsider leaving 6S to the originals — we've been rocking it since the millennium, after all."

The marketing firm says it considered running a full-page ad in the New York Times, but admits the truck billboard fit its budget better.

The company is also using the hashtag #WeAre6S on social media to raise awareness of their name claim.

'Small but mighty'

Chris Breikss, the president of 6S Marketing, says the company knows it's too late to change the name of the iPhone, but wanted to send a message in the most Canadian way possible.

"This is about our agency being small but mighty," he said, adding that if Apple does call its new phone the 6S, it won't spell the end of the world.

"For us, it means maybe a year of sharing the same name," he says, though conceding the 6S play on words [say it out loud and it sounds like success) might be devalued.

6S Marketing has not heard from Apple, and Breikss says he doesn't expect the notoriously secretive company to reach out.

Apple has not revealed the name of the new phone. An announcement is expected Sept. 9.