A story that made me grin this week was the British Make -Up survey by the high street store Debenhams, which reveals that Northern women slap it on far more than southern girls do. Apparently the northern lasses use three times as much fake tan and pink lip gloss in pursuit of the sun-kissed look in the longer winters whereas more educated Southern middle-class girls prefer concealer, tinted moisturises and pore-perfecting, in search of the more refined alabaster look. What made me chuckle the most is the way the Essex girls let the south down so badly, not only going for the sun beds and fake tan volume but some wearing THREE pairs of false eye lashes at the SAME time! The lipstick kings are the Midlands lasses, where women own an average of ten each. Lipstick sales always rise in recession as women chase men to pay the bills. Someone needs to tell the female host of Strictly Come Dancing about the above survey. What's with the blow up doll lips look Tess!

Anyhow, Lynx deodorant and shower gel products, a very successful range funder the British/Dutch Company Unilever, is what I want to talk about here. Whereas girls can wear that slap to attract the boys, us boys have to rely on being manly and in charge to get the girls. We can't smell like girls, of course, so we have to smell like real men, Lynx making great claims on their TV commercials that their deodorants and shower gels will attract the fairer sex, gorgeous ones to, the so-called 'Lynx effect', but often using fey looking chaps in those ads. In fact so popular are their adverts because of this rather erroneous promise that you will get laid they are by far the number one selling male deodorants in the United Kingdom, why Lynx (real name French company Axe) they feel they can charge three quid a can! They even have an agony aunt blog on the website to help you with dating advice and where to spray and clean. When you buy a branded product remember you are buying that advertising and not what's in it, the metal Lynx can itself worth seventeen times the value of what's in it, material wise, apparently. The reason why spray deodorant is always in a metal can is they require a higher air pressure inside the can to enable the aerosol action and so a plastic casing would collapse in on itself.

Lynx regularly update their scents and flavours and spend a lot of money on their advertising to reflect that, a case where the company allows the actual advert and not the actual smell and feel of the product to sell it. The current campaign is the one with the beautiful angels, where they throw their halos to the ground and pursue an average Joe who washes in Lynx deodorant and shower gel, of course. The tag line now is the cleaner you are the dirtier you get, again proclaiming stunning young women will drop everything to sleep with a man who paid an extortionate three quid for deodorant. They never suggest ugly men would get the girl if they smear their puny bodies with it, the plainly handsome chaps who do get lucky are supposed to be you [males]. I think you have all seen the advert with the guy using the beach shower and the girls imitating him.

The shower gel is much cheaper and so I buy that without argument. Again you are buying the branding as these things are made of the same chemicals as all the other brands and makes in the same factories and so no mystery ingredients. The current ranges are Excite, Africa and Midnight. They also have the Cool Metal range, which, I presume, is for the more macho men than the blokes in the ads.

You don't have to visualise my naked body in the shower if you don't want to but there maybe one or two of you of a certain age that maybe flustered from that description. Application of the gel is supposed to be for showers as you smear it all over your body, of which a suitable amount of lather and bubbles are produced. The ranges are a funky colour and deliver that familiar acidic bitter taste when you get a mouth fill. I usually rub it into my right pectoral first and then my left one, before going lower down to my honed six-pack on my tanned athletic torso. If I'm going out for a drink soon after then a double soaking of the crown jewels and the old todger and then once around the peachy bottom maybe required in case I get lucky. Beware though, if you get too much gel on the shower floor it's very slippy and you could go ass-over-tit and jam your todger in the plug ole!

The shower gels price around £1.50 a 250ml bottle and the sprays up to and extravagant £2.99 a 150ml can in some chain stores. If you use it liberally that may last only a week or two. It's ludicrously expensive and pretty much the same product and size but under a different name - say in Wilkinson's - will be 49p a can. I prefer to spend 49p a can and would never spend on the Lynx deodorant spray brand. The big chains and supermarkets effectively match each other prices for this type of brand and so hard to find value. Price matching is apparently not price-fixing. I think Lynx tried a roll on deodorant but I have never used one of them and always hate to see my arm hairs and the girlfriends bits caught up in the roller. Yuk!

Again, although the various ranges of Lynx products suggest sport and sex the average punter buying these in Sainsbury's suggests the exact opposite. I think they also do some aftershaves and shower gel although again rather expensive. They do gift packs all year around if you want the full works but if you bought the items separately in the packs they would be much cheaper I suspect. Boots do a good two for three offer of these gift packs if you are interested and so maybe better to buy in bulk.

On the whole you though can't argue that Lynx stuff smells nice and they do a good range and as long as they keep doing the eye candy adverts and convincing young men with the getting the girls campaigns they will continue to be top dog. They haven't gone the celebrity way and so their stuff will always appeal to the everyday guy with their non pretentious approach to selling their wares.



.