Consume like a man

I call Mario Lopez for my hovel-mate ... and birthing partner.
I call Mario Lopez for my hovel-mate … and birthing partner.

For the past several years, writers from Fox News to the rest of the media have said that (straight) American men are dying out … or less hysterically, we’re falling behind as a gender. We’re less likely to graduate from college, hold a white-collar job or follow the convoluted familial relations in Once Upon a Time. And now, with advances in reproductive technology and unwanted third world children, we’re not even needed for our seed.

Fortunately, there’s one segment of the population that still needs men: shitty entrepreneurs whose ideas were terrible to begin with or forgot to market to the hairier half of the U.S. population.

This is the story of the resulting products. Get shopping, men, or I shall surely meet you in District XY, where will be kept until we evolve the means to reproduce, Jurassic Park-style.

Brogurt

It’s a known fact that the female half of the population are like aquariums and can’t poop unless they eat bacteria every time they change their yogurt out for the day. However, the other, maler half poops all the time, sometimes when thinking too hard about math.

It's how we figured out the formula for sending humans to the moon in a dong that farts fire.
It’s how we figured out the formula for sending humans to the moon in a dong that farts fire.

So, how do you sell Greek yogurt to men? Well, if there’s one market aimed squarely at Internet Tough Guys and middle aged divorcés, it’s the fitness industry. Put the emphasis on “Greek” by slapping some 300 abs on the box and declaring it “powerful.”

Boom! Your stomach is in the ESPN Zone!
Boom! Your stomach is in the ESPN Zone!

And that’s how you make yogurt the perfect meal for isocarbolating your pecs on chest day. It’s part of a balanced workout along with your Red Army kettle ball set and myriad of forearm flexer-uppers.

Nadscrubbers

Fact: Men will buy anything shaped like an athletic supporter.
Fact: Men will buy anything shaped like an athletic supporter.

Not only can’t women poop without probiotic bacteria, but they also can’t naturally shed their skin cells. Much like bears, they need special scrubbers called loofahs to scrape the dead cells away, or they will die. Or itch. Whatever.

Men, on the other hand, didn’t even know that epidermal gangrene was a problem. That is, not until AXE realized that their douche spray was easily counteracted with over-the-counter soap. It worried the executive bro-scientists at Unilever that, for the five minutes between showering and applying AXE Body Spray, there was a window of opportunity for a hypothetical woman in your bathroom to say, “Hey, Irish Spring smells much better.”

While the fitness crowd has been sneaking loofahs into the showers since the Ironhead days, how do you reach dudes that are more into first person shooters, Madden and racing games? By calling it the Axe Detailer Shower Tool. Now it sounds like what Paul Walker and Vin Diesel soap each other up with between takes in the latest Faster, Furiouser movie.

Man Candles

Oh, and did I mention that the brogurt makes men poop, too? The makers of Powerful Yogurt really did just relabel Greek yogurt, probiotics and all. (It may be part of an agreement every other nation made to kickstart Greece’s economy again.)

There are some things that soap will never clean, like air. And matches don’t burn long enough to cover up a Jamie Lee Curtis. If only men could buy candles. If only …

Hey, look: Yankee Candle thought they could fill an untapped market niche without doing any actual research about what men would like to smell.

"Or to other hu-man types. For instance: the fe-males of y-- I mean, our shared species."
“Or to other hu-man types. For instance: the fe-males of y– I mean, our shared species.”

The creatively named Man Candles come in the scents of sawdust, football equipment, cheap aftershave and blistering yard work.

Two of the scents, “2X4” and “Riding Mower” are the world’s most passive-aggressive reminder for men to get to work around the house. And the other two, “Man Town” and “First Down” were clearly ripped off from some old gay porno mags left in the warehouse the company bought in the 1970s.

Out of the three products in this post, the Yankee Candle Company’s cynical attempt to sell women’s products to men says the most about our gender’s future. If we really want to succeed, then maybe it’s time to take a cue from women and buy the things that define success. Or, at the very least, make purchases that are measurable on our corporate betters’ quarterly reports so that they’ll keep giving us income.

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