A man in a woman's world

Do women hold the monopoly for vanity?

No.

Men, too, are vain. Only, most of them hide in the closet, never wanting to be discovered that yes, they also use, uhmm, anti-aging creams. Some of the men I know are the culprits why their wives’ beauty products are emptied fast, so fast that they end up having tighter, firmer and more lifted skin than their wives. They sometimes connive with their wives not to tell others about this seemingly sacred secret â€â€Â even as a jest â€â€Â for fear that they will be the butt of joke.

And if vanity is not for them, too, why do men in the gym narcissistically flex their muscles in front of the mirror in the locker room, carefully inspecting if they have finally achieved those washboard abs and ripping biceps and triceps. Or have you noticed male golfers now? Before they tee off, they surely apply sunblock first. Unlike the lady golfers, however, not all men apply sunscreen creams in the greens. Many of them still "hide" in the locker room where they apply SPF cream all over them.

In a country like ours where machismo still plagues the psyche of many, it is indeed a big deal, fearful to some extent, for many men when others find out that they also "beautify" themselves. What has machismo got to do with a man’s preference to protect himself from the damaging effects of the sun to his skin? I don’t understand why SPF cannot be discussed openly under the sun among men. Oh vanity, it is not the sole domain of women.

"Vanity may be a harsh word. Let me just say that men, like women, also want to look good," says Bob Briddon, president and general manager of Avon Philippines. Yes, Bob is a man in a woman’s world and he does not find it hard to reconcile that a male boss like him is on top of the world’s leading direct seller of beauty products. Bob is unaffected even if the business he heads in the country has this tag line: "A company for women."

"Yes, Avon is a company for women... and a few good men," he says, letting go of an impish smile. That smile of Bob matures into a hearty laughter, short of letting me know that he has come out of the closet to tell all that real men should bear no qualms to use products perceived by many as only for women.

The confidence in Bob is probably brought about by his beautiful relationship with his wife. Bob, who finished a degree in Industrial Engineering in London, is also very much in touch with his two sisters and a brother in UK whom he regularly calls.

"As a matter of fact," says the 53-year-old Bob, "marketing female products is very challenging. It teaches me to be more sensitive in handling things. When dealing with women, more camaraderie is required of me. And I should have a different kind of humor. This also gives me the chance to understand women better, to love what they do. My affinity to our products helps me accomplish my task."

And to do his job, it surely entails Bob hard work. (Avon is the world’s leading direct seller of beauty and related products, with $6.8 billion in annual revenues worldwide. Avon markets to women around the world through 4.4 million independent sales representatives.) In the Philippines, relates Bob, about 600 are employed by Avon with 400,000 franchise dealers â€â€Â 99 percent are women and one percent, men. All these able bodies of Avon, Bob says, work very hard to attain the company’s goals.

Bob, for one, is not alien to hard work. His parents taught him that in UK early on.

"I was born to a working class family. My father worked in the railways as a train driver. He taught me about work ethics â€â€Â how to value a job, how to handle money wisely," Bob recalls. He adds that from his mother, he learned the love for family. "That no matter what, we should stick with each other. As the youngest of four kids, I’m just very lucky to have very active and very positive siblings."

The positive vibes he gets from his family is the same positive energy he brings with him wherever he is assigned. Having been with Avon for 29 years, starting as operational manager in UK in 1978, Bob has been posted all over including South Africa, New York, Hong Kong and Thailand. He has only been in the Philippines for one year now and he intends to stay longer because "Filipinos sincerely find time to have fun no matter the crisis."

"I will definitely resist any attempt to transfer me anywhere. I simply love it here," he says, again with a smile.

Indeed Bob is very positive about the products he markets in the Philippines. At the recent launch of Avon’s newest skincare breakthrough â€â€Â Anew Clinical ThermaFirm Face Lifting Cream â€â€Â at Shangri-La Mactan in Cebu, Bob says he uses every single product his company introduces to the market. In fact, like a real ambassador of skincare products, Bob admits to using these two creams: Anew Retroactive in the morning to protect himself from the sun; and Anew Alternative to rejuvenate his skin at night. If that is not coming out of the closet, what is? He even shares his "beauty" regimen with his wife. And the bathroom in their apartment in Fort Bonifacio in Taguig is, you guessed it right, filled with Avon skincare products which he and his better half use regularly, reliably, religiously.

Well, Bob is British. Europeans and Americans, observes Bob, really are open to these things â€â€Â beautification. Filipinos, he says, are not yet ready for beauty products distinctly for them. In the hierarchy of the needs of Filipino men, Bob enthuses, "clothes, entertainment, sports and San Miguel Light will likely figure on top of the list." Couple them with soap, deodorant, shaving cream, fragrance and toothpaste as addendum. Men, he says, will last or least spend their hard earned money on beauty products.

In the US, Bob explains, about 30 to 35 percent of men have come into the open, saying they also use beauty products for women, and to some extent, admitting that they share their partners’ products. In New York, for example, highlights Bob, Avon’s Driven skincare line for men endorsed by famous Yankee slugger Derek Jeter is selling like the proverbial hotcake. "In fact, a lot of women are buying Driven for their husbands," he says. Bob admits he cannot approximate how many of the men in Asia, let alone in the Philippines, use facial creams. Well, they have yet to come out of their cocoon so they can be well accounted for.

Men have the right to defy the law of gravity, too. Where women can hide the signs of aging with makeup, men cannot. Unless they reach for that cream, the probable cure-all for their near-to-sag skin.

Oh well, men can be tough on themselves while they remain good to their skin. And it won’t make them less of a man if they come out of the closet while applying that cream on their face. Please pass me that ThermaFirm!

(For your new beginnings, please e-mail me at bumbaki@yahoo.com or my.new.beginnings@gmail.com.

Have a blessed Sunday!)