Years of having to choose between Mango Berry and Passion Fruit shampoos has left me in a state of permanent smell indifference. Caring that my head smells like a strawberry pounded into a kiwi has never been on the top of my list. Every visit to Wal-Mart’s bath soaps isle has just been a required chore to appease the hygiene gods.

The shampoo and body wash isle has forever been an island to female-centered advertising. Just look at the picture to the left. The bright purples light greens and vivid whites just accentuate the already loaded advertising. Each bottle features one of the following keywords: gentle, beautiful, healthy, shine, sparkle, silky and sexy. Assuming the 300 million individuals in the United States wash their hair, some 150 million U.S. males are lathering in a concoction of frilly smells from pink bottles. Just a visit to www.suave.com reveals just exactly what Suave’s target audience is.

But all is not bad. Men do have selection. Soap advertisers have finally realized the potential in male oriented marketing. A trip to the 2006 Wal-Mart Supercenter of the year passed me into shampoo enlightenment. Of the shelves upon shelves of female-targeted soap I managed to discover seven – yes seven – choices of shampoo with a distinctly male flare. They were simple, and no scent was listed. To note, no place on any bottle were the magic keywords repeated. In fact, Suave even placed a bold heading of “MEN” on their bottles; which is all the more reason a guy would ever need to purchase it.

Old Spice, Axe, Coast, Dial, Suave and Softsoap are active contenders for the male audience’s cash flow. Axe and Suave are both owned by Unilever, which makes male deodorant. Old Spice does as well. That leaves Coast, Dial and Softsoap as the only pure soap and shampoo companies to take advantage of male oriented advertising (the deodorant corps has been doing it for years). And, from personal memory, I can say this move to wrangle men into purchasing shampoo has only happened within the past three years. Many stores, including grocery distributors such as Food Lion and Publix still do not carry male oriented shampoos in the majority of their stores. Suave has been the most successful with their “MEN” soap line. It has penetrated the lines of many grocery stores across the nation.

I am all right with buying strawberry milk shampoo with hearts on the label; in fact I have been doing so for some time. The sales rep at Wal-Mart says nothing as I pay. The other Wally-World patrons, stuck on the choice of Banana Explosion or Soothing Berry, notice nothing as I take the glittered milk bottle from shelf. Perhaps I secretly enjoy my hair smelling like the ocean breeze as I make the Pantene Pro V hair swipes in the mirror.

Or maybe, just maybe, I just want a chemical solution that cleans my hair.

With all the new add on features… what was the point of shampoo again?