72 hours
Of course it happened.
15 years ago (see below) I wrote a silly blog about the insanity of deodorant advertising, predicting that we would eventually be seeing advertisements for 72 hour-long deodorants.
And of course we now are.
I wrote a long time ago about the problem of time only running in one direction with relation to marketing ploys. Back then I predicted the eventual production of razors with nine blades. Whist steeled for this I was still somewhat shocked to see five bladed razors on sale the other day. A brief word on them before returning to my new discovery.
I have no doubt razor companies will keep competing on numbers of blades. But it has made me wonder how they are going to explain the need for the marginal blade when their very expensive graphics for three blades suggested the first cut the hair leaving a bit left, the second takes most of that away and the third takes what is left. So for the fourth to work there would need to be something else left to take. A way around this for them might be invent the Remaining-Hair-Half-Life: each blade cuts a fixed proportion of what remains is cut away. At the ninth cut this will probably be down to the atomic level, but it would undeniably be a smooth shave. (Another problem is that one stroke of a two bladed razor is presumably the same as two swipes of a single bladed razor, so in some regards more blades just reduces time needed to shave, but if there is a diminishing marginal return to each blade, they surely need to come up with a better story for blade three onwards.)
Back to my new discovery: “48 hour deodorant protection”. My issues are (a) why would this be needed (b) wouldn’t buying it admit you have hygiene or lifestyle issues and (c) isn’t 48 hours a rather precise number?
Why might you need it? If you used the deodorant on Monday morning you would not need to reapply until Wednesday morning. But do not most people wash at least once every 48 hours? Maybe this is intended for rig workers or junior doctors.
If you are one of those people who do wash, it should be remembered that doing so washes off deodorant. Or perhaps they are claiming this is no longer the case and you only need to use deodorant once every two days, hence making this a recession friendly innovation.
Whatever reason was dreamt up in the boardroom, the clever marketing types must have hoped this new marvel would resonate with an audience that feels the previously launched and now ubiquitous and presumably humdrum 24 hour protection is simply not enough. (And why 24 hours are needed anyway would presumably be for insomniacs or enthusiastic sleep-sweat freaks who find 18 our protection inadequate to their needs.)
So my next prediction is that eventually we will have deodorant with 72 hour protection which we will wonder how we ever lived without. And we live in unique times as in nearly living memory of some people many products didn’t exist and we will not be able to turn back time. I challenge someone to find single bladed razors.