"Be your best" Gillette exhort - by shaving/shampooing/styling with our products.  Mmm.  See the ad here.  A Momentously expensive ad campaign, no doubt - especially as they seem to have bought up (with the exception of Ronaldo & Lewis Hamilton) a huge swathe of the world's top sporting stars.  To be honest, it looks a bit dated to me.  But hey, I would say that wouldn't I ;-)

Don't get me wrong - I think Roger Federer winning Wimbledon and 15 Grand Slams is an awesome achievement.  But it made me laugh when I read a blog posting about Gillette giving him a 15 bladed Fusion to celebrate!  Tiger Woods is a great golfer - the world's greatest ever in many people's views.  But really, does shaving with Fusion deliver him tournament winning performances, time after time?

I think not.  However, brands like to align themselves with champions, but today's Champion always has a Challenger.

And, as I posted in response to an article on '5 reasons why Gillette is the best a man can get' (here) - Gillette are in an interesting place.  Having dialled the brand into a cul-de-sac (selling the most, charging the most - in true monopolly fashion) they've got to somehow continue this growth.

In the meantime, we're growing inexorably and strongly upwards with our Azor system razor - now launching in Japan, Brazil, the USA (imminently), South Africa, and later this year in another major country.

We're not getting our market share because guys are shaving more.  No, we're getting it because our Azor is appealing to 'Generation Now' - guys who aren't necessarily interested whether shaving with Gillette has made Tiger, Roger, Derek or Thierry 'winners' (they know its their natural or developed talent, not shaving) and are more intelligent.

And, after all - why would you want to be the 'Best' when you can be a 'King' (and save a King's ransom by using our Azor - with 'better' coming soon...)

As to poor old Schick/Wilkinson Sword - stuck between us coming up, and Gillette sitting atop, well - that's another story in itself.

Don't just shave, King of Shaves.  Join our Kingdom!

This huge sum, the GDP of some developing nations, was spent by Gillette on Fusion in the recession ravaged USA alone, convincing customers that Fusion's 5 blades costing £2.50 are better than Mach3's three.  Despite the fact that Fusion blades cost up to twice as much as their Mach3 replacement, yet lasted about as long (and this about half as long as our Azor Endurium blades).

As we approach the anniversary of the King of Shaves Azor launch, we're making serious inroads into the UK shaving market, with not only a fraction of this spend, but with a product that (independent, unbiased) Which? magazine not only rates a 'best buy' but 'exceptional value' too.

Indeed, they even run a brief article comparing our Azor Endurium cartridges (at £1.25 or less) with Fusion Power cartridges (at £2.50) asking "are razor blades a rip-off?'

This is market disrupting stuff.  With over 15,000 new Azor converts joining us in enjoying the 'King of Shaves, without Gillette's ransom' each and every week, I can see why they need to spend so much money - in the UK, we estimate their market spend to be around £30,000,000 - Thirty Million Pounds.

Funny, that like Apple's iPod, people are switching to our King of Shaves Azor as an embodiment of stylish, product performance, which pushes shaving simplicity first, and marketing nonsense second.  Plus, with our 'Technology of Bendology', we know Batteries and Extra (over-priced) blades simply aren't cutting it anymore.

Would we spend over £150m on marketing the Azor.  Seriously doubt it - I'd plough it back in to making King of Shaves more and more the 'Future of Shaving', and invest in you, the customer, rather than trying to buy loyalty through marketing.  Will King of Shaves be the 'new best a man can buy'.

Absolutely.

I was amused to see this picture in top online golf eZine, In Golf We Trust. 

Good find, guys - and thanks for bigging up the Azor, I shouldn't think the top brass at Gillette Central will be too happy to see the world's best golfer sprouting whiskers, especially as Gillette sponsor him with squillions of dollars.

Check it out here

And if you're looking for the shaving equivalent of Tiger Woods when he broke into the world of professional golf many years ago, and reinvented it, click here

Not (necessarily) my view, but certainly one being aired by an increasing number of people I talk to. 

For example, check out this blog posting here.  And, I also got emailed the article below from another friend of mine.  I guess when you've had decades of never being challenged, you maybe get a little self indulgent, a little complacent, maybe, just maybe, out of touch with the shaving public.

Perhaps the Fusion 'forced hardware upgrade" is one step too far...who knows, only time will tell.  But, Gillette's latest TV campaign is certainly not donig this behemoth of a brand any favours.  Forcing the poor chap to upgrade from his mighty Mach3 to the Hummer (and if it's powered, Humming) of a Fusion.  Mr Shaver wanting to shave closer, longer, for less - Guy, go straight to the Azor, and do yourself a favour...

Especially when 'Google Chrome' is spooling up...if you know what I mean.

---------------------

Monday, August 25, 2008 Irish Times

High-flying elite set for a rude awakening

 Indulged superstars at the top of the game blissfully unaware of life's harsh reality

THERE'S SOMETHING peculiar about Gillette's latest advertising campaign. You must have seen it by now: unsuspecting menfolk - all boasting the kind of marble-sculpted physiques and casually tousled hair that just scream real life - are preparing to scrape America's leading brand of razor over their fizzogs when they are blasted with sporting equipment by, in turn, Tiger Woods, Roger Federer and Thierry Henry.

It's all rather confusing. The message is that we all know, deep down, we should be releasing the man inside and getting the best we can get with Gillette's latest trimming machine - we just need a little push in the right direction.

In reality, that becomes rather blurred by the trauma of seeing three of modern sport's true superheroes taking sadistic glee in belting hard objects at stubbly-chinned Schmucks, leaving them whimpering on the floor in a puddle of their own blood and teeth. Federer has a particularly crazed glint in his eye when he crunches a forehand into some hapless Joe's jaw-bone, suggesting a role in the torture-porn industry beckons once he finally hangs up his flannels.

I'm no marketing man - and as the picture above suggests, I'm not a great one for shaving, either - but these are not the kind of images which suggest much blue-sky thinking at Gillette HQ, unless casting their elite stars as weirdo stalkers intent on actual bodily harm is part of some hidden master plan.

And there is another, more intractable, problem for Gillette. Spookily, as if the multinational was being punished by the corporate gods, its hiring of Woods, Federer and Henry just happened to coincide with their descent into sporting mortality.

Within weeks of their first commercial outing, Woods finally succumbed to his dicky knee, leaving his hopes of overhauling Jack Nicklaus's record of 18 Majors looking as dicey as Ian Poulter's plus-fours; Federer has been bludgeoned into submission by Spanish superstar Rafael Nadal and now doesn't seem to be able to tell one end of a tennis racket from another; and Henry, already in decline when he left Arsenal for Barcelona, looks only slightly less ill at ease in Catalonia than General Franco.

The Irish Times

Barack, it's like this.  You're Tiger Woods, and you can win your debut professional golf tournament, the US Masters (or in your case the US 2008 Presidential Election).

You need a white caddy (possibly Hillary, but unlikely).  You need a great ad agency (Nike's - definitely).  And you need to wear Nike (and maybe get Spike Lee to shoot a bit of edgy campaign video, Eminem to write your rap - OB08).

Seriously, job done. 

And if you want me to make sure it happens, 'cos I'm the master of brand disruption, drop me an email via www.KingofShaves.com.  "Wilkinette" are quaking.

The future of America is black & white.  Ebony & Ivory.  Obama & Clinton.  Go for the hole.  Just do it.

And enjoy the King of Shaves on polling day.  Remember, to be the 21st century's (Martin Luther) King - the first black US president, you gotta shave like one!

Check this posting out. interesting, eh.
You spend all that money (sorry, men, buying Gillette Fusion at £2.50/replacement blade allow Gillette to spend all that money) and it doesn't exactly get traction from the very people you want to buy your proudcts.

The marketers have taken over at Gillette.

And not in a good way.

Arrogance breeds complacency. Complacency delivers broken business models and failure. You read it here first.

King of Blades is coming...

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