Old Spice New Campaign Touts Smells of the Wild with Foxcrest, Hawkridge & Wolfthorn (2013) {New Perfumes} {Men's Colognes}
Old Spice have launched a new advertising campaign for their three new scents for men called Foxcrest, Hawkridge and Wolfthorn. According to the brand, the fragrances are targeting men to “bring in guys who think right now that everything in our lineup smells the same” and “who want scents to be more subtle,” but also wish their perfumes to express dominance and be "intimidating" as they are still at a stage in their lives where they feel insecure and are trying to figure out their lives, we are told {Via NYT}....
As always, Old Spice advertising copy is a real draw with its trademark humor and outlandish yet borderline plausible claims about what perfume can do for you,
"Scientists once believed that the scent most pleasurable to a woman was an old leather medicine ball soaked in champagne. They have since realized that even more pleasurable than that old medicine ball is the scent of Old Spice Foxcrest, which is said to smell like the golden hairs of a young appaloosa horse playing in a mountain spring."
While the ads portray suave gentlemen in their forties, the demographic Old Spice are going for is the higher end of the 18-24 year-old bracket who can project themselves in these images of more accomplished versions of themselves, down the line,
"There are three scents in the world guaranteed to make men into handsome gentlemen of nonstop romantic successes. All three of those scents were outsmarted by a complicated Trojan-horse scheme and then eaten by Hawkridge. Hawkridge now wields all their smells combined to incite in females an unstoppable rampage of tender compliments and face caresses that all men would consider successful."
Three powerful animal totems were selected, the fox, more intellectual and known for its cunning, the hawk and the wolf,
"The night is full of romantic mysteries, but none of them are more romantically mysterious than the mystery of the prowling wolf. Add thorns and you have Wolfthorn, the sharpest romantic mystery available in a smelling solution."
The giveaway to some extent are the body spray cans in which the perfumes are offered. Normally, these are favored by teenagers. As its functional orientation implies, it encourages less discriminate perfume spraying all over the body which makes the scent lean closer to a deodorant. We're in fine perfume territory but with a sportier feel and a less "effeminate" type of gesture.
Gestures while applying perfume - or a beauty product - are very important to the sense of grooming and beauty ritual constructed around the product so we can see in these Old Spice body sprays something that feels like a hybrid product.
I see it as a sort of dance, more or less harmonious, with the partner-product. A good synergy between you and the bottle of perfume or jar of cream or a palette of colors enhances the experience and may decide whether or not the product stays in your life.
The question we might be left with is whether they invite you to consolidate the functional culture of men's scents or help usher in a taste for fine fragrances.
