In The Very Pits

There’s this survey which said that 30 per cent of humans do not use deodorant and they all travel by public transport; which probably explains why one never hears of a romance starting on a bus or a train. It also explains why there are so many deo adverts on television these days, the marketing equivalent of sweat equity. All one can hear during commercial breaks is the hiss of a deodorant spray on a chest. It’s all very sensual and subliminal. There’s even one which has a woman’s hand stroking a series of phallic-shaped cans which all collapse except for one that becomes enlarged and then erupts. The ad is for a deodorant called Cobra and it leaves nothing to the imagination. It appears on prime-time television and is so expli­cit it really should get the axe instead of the Bond kiss, except that Axe is the name of a rival deodorant brand and its ads have only slightly less of a sexual suggestion. It’s in the name of the Axe Effect, where one spray apparently makes a man irresistible to women.

The Cobra ad is actually a rip-off of a Perrier ad that was banned for being obs­cene. Clearly, something stinks but the sudden spray of deodorant ads carries its own story; Indians haven’t suddenly acquired a collective case of body odour which requires a deodorant-based Swachh Bharat to counter, but men have started buying so many antiperspirants that it’s made the country one of the biggest deodorant markets in the world. That has led to the armpit war, if you will, and an incredible number of brands fighting for (male?) supremacy. There are some 300 brands, national and regional, targeting the male underarm. From a market size of Rs 283 crore in 2007, it has gone up to Rs 2,100 crore in 2014, making it the fastest growing product in the FMCG category. Now, it’s all about advertising and branding, and so we have the Fogg of War: no MNC, just a canny enterpreneur called Darshan who owns Vini Cosmetics. He was the former promoter of Paras Pharma which marketed brands like Moov, Krack Cream, Livon and Itchgard. With Fogg blanketing the electronic media, the marketing was geared around value for money and a product different from the rest. Customers were told they get 800 sprays from a bottle of Fogg Royal (priced at Rs 170) with the tagline ‘No Gas, Only Deo’. Fogg is now the market leader.  Deos are in the personal care category, which is generally dominated by women, but here, the deodorant market is dominated by men, and the daily bombardment of deo ads could have something to do with it.

Axe plugs itself as a chick magnet, as does Old Spice. Axe (Lynx in some markets) is owned by Unilever, while Old Spice is from Procter & Gamble. Cobra, like Fogg, is an Indian brand from the Vi-John group. Then there is Engage made by ITC, Park Avenue by Raymond. Wild Stone, Nivea, Palmolive, Old Spice and Provogue plus sports brands like Nike and Adidas, followed by a host of local products, including one called Lady Diana. The adv­ertising message is consistently banal and uniformly sexist: that one spray on a man leaves women swooning. If only life imitated ads. Cobra deo’s brand ambassador is Emraan Hashmi, the serial kisser.  Old Spice has a bare-chested Milind Soman claiming he is irresistible when he uses Old Spice. Hrithik Roshan plugs He from Emami, Arjun Rampal for Nivea and Ranbir Kapoor Casanova from Axe. To save Indian sensibilities, most of the women in these ads are blondes.

In fact, a huge furore came up some years ago when Unilever’s then boss stated: “No one has found a way of making Asians self-conscious about body odour.” He now has to take another sniff at Asian armpits, since the men seem to have figured that the way to instant sexual nirvana is just a spray or two away.  The rise of the metrosexual man is not the only reason why deodorants are suddenly flying off the shelves. Rural India has discovered deo power as well, thanks to local brands that provide cheap, overpowering body sprays. After a hard day’s work in the fields, the farmer can ditch his son-of-the-soil persona and head for the nearest market smelling of roses. They are now all part of the New World Odour.

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All the fuss could very well be for nothing. Hand sanitisers contain a similar proportion of alcohol content that kills odour-carrying bacteria. They could easily replace deos and all the hyper around it.