Spicing Things Up!

With all the Old Spice videos, wouldn’t you think that “The Man Your Man Could Smell Like” promotion would have boosted sales?









Unfortunately for Proctor & Gamble this was not the case according to a recent article from Time.com.

Though the tall, dark and handsome man is nice to look at, mixed messages might have been the issue with these ads.  Old Spice’s tagline was “Smell Like a Man, Man” however the ads themselves were consistently directed towards women.  If I have learned anything in the marketing world it is “always be consistent” and “know your market.”  Directing the ads towards women in the first place was a very interesting concept, however Old Spice did not follow through by having the tagline match this idea.  It is as though they wanted to make the product appeal to both men and women but never decided who the end consumer was.

Isaiah Mustafa, the face of Old Spice, has now become the topic of discussions among many.  He’s made appearances on a variety of shows such as Good Morning America, The Ellen DeGeneres Show and even The Oprah Winfrey Show.  Everyone now refers to him as “The Old Spice Guy” which seems to be just fine with him.



It is hard to develop brand recognition through a catchy advertisement.  For example, I could see the same commercial a dozen times and know exactly what happens in it.  However, unfortunately for a lot of companies, that doesn’t necessarily mean I know what product is being advertised.  Of course the ultimate goal when creating an advertisement is sales.  So not only does a company have to create a catchy advertisement and develop brand recognition from this advertisement, they also have to be able to create sales.  Proctor & Gamble made it 2/3 of the way but unfortunately for them, that was not enough.

Will the Old Spice Guy stay part of the Old Spice Team?  We’ll just have to wait and see.