Keep It Classy, Gents

            Guys, there are some rules you shouldn’t break. Brushing your teeth every day and using Old Spice coupons for deodorant are non-negotiable (and every girl I know will back me up on that). Here are a few more style faux pas to avoid if you don’t want to run your chances of impressing a girl before you’ve even opened your mouth.

            Don’t wear shorts with a sportcoat or bucks. You can actually wear a sportcoat AND bucks AND shorts, so long as the shorts and coat are beautifully tailored. But if you do just the bucks or just the coat, you’ll look like an overgrown schoolboy. And skip the socks.

            Keep your belt and shoes from clashing. The two don’t have to match exactly, but they need to compliment one another. Red shoes do not necessitate a red belt – a neutral one will work better.

That said, there are other rules that you can (and should) break – you just need to know how.

            Conventional wisdom says that you can’t pair black and brown or navy. Conventional wisdom is wrong. To pull it off, try coordinating with different fabrics and textures. Black leather gloves look great with a brown wool coat, for example.

            You can layer denim without looking like you’re rocking a Canadian tuxedo, but be careful – sink tonalities.

            Ladies say no white after labor day, but there’s no reason to retire your white attire. Bright whites are fine as long as its warm outside, and when the weather turns cool you can opt for warmer winter whites like ivory. Just be sure to use your old spice coupons for an aluminum-free deodorant when wearing white – products with deodorant interact with chemicals in sweat and cause yellowish stains on white clothes. 

MLS Gets Spicy

         

          Though it’s a game beloved the world over, and though more than one billion people tune in to its world championship game every four years, soccer is still an upstart in the United States. To help break into the mainstream, Major League Soccer – the official governing body of professional soccer stateside – took inspiration from Old Spice coupons.

         It’s actually a good idea – Old Spice was a relatively under-appreciated brand before the revolutionary Old Spice Guy advertisements premiered last year, and MLS is hoping that a spoof of the iconic campaign will help the organization breakthrough to the mainstream.

         In the video, Chivas USA midfielder Michael Lahoud channels Isaiah Mustafa (all the way down to the white towel) in an effort to sell more tickets to the game, and I can tell you that he’s got my attention. If the guys start playing shirtless, I can guarantee that they’ll sell more tickets to female spectators.

         You’d never see Tom Brady or Kobe Bryant doing this – not that they’d have to – but I think this shows a sense of humor and an inventiveness that I don’t always expect from elite athletes. It’s funny, and it makes me want to use Old Spice coupons and watch soccer at the same time – and it’s also established Lahoud as my new favorite soccer player (sorry, Becks). 

Old Spice: An Explosive Success

         Old Spice made an explosive entry into the marketing world last year when the company introduced a new ad campaign featuring bare-chested manly-man Isaiah Mustafa, aka “The Old Spice Guy.” The ads went viral; the company’s image was instantly given a hip, funny revamp; and the use of Old Spice coupons skyrocketed.

         But as it turns out, Old Spice has always made headlines – just not always on their own terms. I was recently cleaning out my grandma’s basement when I found, in an old issue of the Boston Globe (July 1968 to be exact – the basement cleaning I did was looooong overdue), a story about a guy who tried to hijack a plane by claiming that he had a grenade in his hand. The hijacker waved a fake gun around, demanded to be flown to Cuba, and then pulled out his “grenade” to scare the plane’s 64 passengers into compliance —but that grenade turned out to be a bottle of Old Spice cologne, and the hijacking was ultimately unsuccessful – though the story successfully reached the pages of newspapers across the country.

         I know Old Spice is powerful stuff, but it’s not powerful enough to do what that crazy hijacker wanted it to do! You can’t use Old Spice coupons to induce terror, thank goodness – you can only use it to smell great. 

Before The Old Spice Guy -- Old Spice XBox Games (an advertising flop)

     Before there was the Old Spice guy, the execs at Old Spice decided that they needed to spice up their usual Old Spice coupons and in-store-display advertising routine by entering a growing sector of the entertainment market – video games.

Advergames have gotten a lot of criticism from the gaming community, because they weasel their way onto Indie gaming channels, but they’re promoting corporations and they aren’t offered for free.

     Old Spice’s games included “Old Spice Racers,” “Newton vs. The Horde,” and “The Fresh Card Game.” As if you could play away your sweaty odor on a videogame console.

       In “Newton” you use an arsenal of weapons, including deodorant, to keep stinky zombies from destroying the world. In “Card Games,” you play a poker-like game, and “Racers” is 45 levels of old-fashioned arcade racing.

        The games didn’t get any kind of rave reviews, but what can you expect from brand-based games?  I can’t imagine paying to play a virtual commercial, and I probably would’nt play a sub-par game even for free. Now that the studly Old Spice guy has revitalized the brand’s image and made Old Spice coupons cool to use, Old Spice doesn’t have to rely on half-hearted efforts at interactive media – and they’ve got the accolades to prove it.