Those awful advertising slogans - 2. Boss Hugo Boss

I am a little mystified by a full page colour ad in the papers. A smartly dressed and fashionably (I assume) unshaven bloke stares at us on the left side. On the right, a picture of a bottle of something that looks like a sample your doctor would turn over musingly in his hands whilst he said “I don’t want to alarm you and I’m fairly sure it’s not too advanced but don’t make any plans for this afternoon”. And some text which fails to make it much clearer. A strapline “Man of Today”. The utterly baffling “Gerard Butler for Boss Bottled”. The words Boss Hugo Boss on the bottle. And at the foot, a hashtag and a repeat of “Man of Today”.

I am hampered here by basic ignorance and a staunch refusal to try to identify who Mr Butler might be. Possibly he is the man in the sharp suit. As there is no little arrow pointing to him I don’t know. Maybe he designed the suit. Or the colour of the stuff in the bottle. Or he was the “creative” from the agency who told the model to go away and come back two days later when his beard would be scruffy enough for the photoshoot.

I am hampered further by the phrase linking Butler to Boss Bottled. Is “Bottled” a verb? Should it read “Gerard Butler for Boss, bottled”? We can imagine Butler perhaps about to take a crucial penalty for struggling Ryman League 2 side Boss. He pulls the shot, they lose and the sports reporter for the local rag has his headline. Or is bottled an adjective? A synonym for drunk? Is that what the stuff does to you? Must be powerful, the bottle looks fairly small.

We shall pass over Boss, Hugo Boss, whose name always reminds of one of Douglas Adams’ best jokes and comes from Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy where the mysterious Slartibartfast is urging the hapless Arthur Dent to follow him;

S: You must come or you will be late
A: Late? What for?
S: What is your name, Earthman?
A: Dent, Arthur Dent.
S: Late as in the late Dent Arthur Dent. It’s a sort of threat, you see.

And that is why I always think of Boss Hugo Boss as if it were one name.

And finally the tagline “Man of Today”, so important that it merits its very own little hashtag as well, ah, bless. I wonder how many people are using it right now on Twitter and similar sites and what on earth for? If you consume a different product from BHB does that make you a man of yesterday, or the month before last?

So in conclusion, m’lud, it is my contention that I have no idea what is being advertised or why it has anything to do with men or today and, as Lord Sugar would say in another context, that’s why I fired it.