I doubt the creative luvvies at Chanel are old enough to know they’re rehashing the classic 1980s advert for the aftershave Old Spice. But that’s not stopping them from using surfing and a hunky surfer (read: Danny Fuller) to sell perfume to blokes (or more likely, their partners) . The Chanel Allure Homme Sport ad is just the latest example of “surfploitation” by companies selling their wares, in this case the olfactory essence of surfing (admittedly, it is a nice stall under the lip).
But that begs the question: what does a surfer smell like?
Chanel says their Allure Homme Sport evokes a, “Sparkling and invigorating freshness, a natural and radiant sensibility, heightening the scent of a breeze against bare skin…to create an infinitely seductive allure.”
Bizarrely, when I asked my own wife what I smell like after surfing, she said it was more like “a heady cocktail of decaying neoprene, diluted sewage, crusty saltiness and occasionally stale pee.”
