Listen up, kids: Old Spice was pretty hip, once

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 12/03/2009 (6233 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

I’m confident, given the fact the world is descending into economic chaos and it is almost impossible to walk along a downtown street without tripping over the bodies of stockbrokers who have flung themselves out the windows of their posh high-rises, that a great many of you are asking yourselves a troubling question: What the heck ever happened to the Old Spice Sailor?

OK, right now all you "old people," defined as "anyone my age," are thinking: "Hey! I remember that guy!"

Whereas you young people are thinking: "Huh?"

Well, I hope you young people are proud of yourselves. I mean, sure, you’ve got your fancy iPods, laptop computers, Wii video game systems, Facebook and Twitter accounts, the ability to send an average 2,200 text messages a month from your cellphones, plus your original hips and knees, but my generation can comfort itself with memories of the Old Spice Sailor.

What do you think of that, young people? Hello, young people? OK, fine, pretend you’re not listening, but I’m going to tell you about the Old Spice sailor anyway. It’s for your own good.

You see, back in a time we called the 1970s, there were only a handful of commercials on TV, and the ones I remember the most were for Old Spice cologne, a heady blend of citrus and spice notes so potent it could be used to jolt gunshot victims out of comas.

Each commercial had the same plot: A ruggedly handsome, clean-shaven sailor wearing a dark blue wool jacket and cap saunters off a ship with a duffel bag slung over his shoulder, wanders around the streets in a manly fashion until, surprise, he hooks up with a really good-looking woman, while we TV viewers listen to some anonymous guy in the background whistling the unforgettable notes to the Old Spice theme song.

Even now, 30 years later, I cannot get that (bad word) whistling — "DUM DUM DE DUM DUM DUM DE DUM DUM" — out of my head.

Is that a cool commercial, or what? Does that not make you want to run out and buy cologne? Well, we did. OK, so we were less sophisticated consumers back then, and we bought gallons of aftershave, largely because, under federal law there were only two presents that kids were legally allowed to give to their dads, namely:

1) An incredibly ugly tie;

2) Old Spice cologne.

Seriously! My buddies and I bought our dads dozens and dozens of bottles of Old Spice, even though, to the best of our knowledge, NONE of them ever wore it. I have no idea what our dads did with all those buoy-shaped bottles, although I do recall that, after any dad on our street had a birthday, neighbourhood pets would suddenly develop a potent citrus-and-spice aroma.

But that’s not the point. The point is I started thinking about the Old Spice Sailor recently when I developed The Killer Cold and Sinus Infection From Hell and spent several hours wandering the aisles of our local drugstore waiting for my head to explode. ("OHMYGAWD! CLEANUP ON AISLE 9!")

That’s when I stumbled on a few dozen bottles of Old Spice Classic, which happened to be on sale. So I bought one, which got me thinking about the sailor, which prompted me to make a long-distance call to Procter & Gamble, which bought the Old Spice brand from the Shulton Company in 1990.

I had a very nostalgic chat with Jay Gooch, the associate director of external relations for Old Spice:

Me: "Jay, do you remember the sailor?"

Jay: "The sailor who came back from the sea?"

Me: "That’s the guy. I forget his name."

Jay: "I don’t think he had a name."

Me: "Uh-huh."

Jay: "Do you know who played him in the commercials?"

Me: "No."

Jay: "It was John Bennett Perry, the father of Matthew Perry from the Friends TV show."

Me: "The Old Spice Sailor was Chandler Bing’s dad???"

Jay: "Uh-huh."

Me: "So, did you deep-six him, or what?"

Jay: "No, he was gone long before we came along. That decision was made by the Shulton Company."

Me: "Did they kill him off in a tragic whaling accident?"

Jay: "No, they went to a whole different campaign. They had him going to Europe and Japan and all over the place and then they were done with the sailor and went to a very family-oriented guy, a dad with his kids and the family, a nice guy in the neighbourhood."

Me: "I don’t remember that guy."

Jay: "Those ads just didn’t become part of the cultural milieu the way the sailor did. He was an iconic entity."

Me: "It says here on Google that the musician who did the whistling in those ads was the same guy who wrote the theme for Sesame Street."

Jay: "Uh-huh."

Me: "Do you miss him? I mean the sailor, not the whistler."

Jay: "Ha ha ha ha ha ha!"

Me: "Yeah, me too. Could you bring him back?"

Jay: "No."

Me: "Please!"

Jay: "Never say never, but I don’t see it happening in the near future."

So that’s where we stand, young people. I know you like those modern TV ads for Old Spice body washes featuring Will Ferrell and LL Cool J and the guy who used to play Doogie Howser, but I think you’d love the sailor. That guy really looked like he smelled good. Know what I mean, young people? Hello? Please stop texting while I’m talking! HELLO? YOUNG PEOPLE?

doug.speirs@freepress.mb.ca