Rugger
Avon (1981)

Avon Rugger (1981) is pretty interesting and thoughtful on paper, but seems to be a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. This of course takes nothing away from the fragrance itself, as we're still right at the very end of Avon's golden era before they plunged into identity crisis Hell that would send them spiraling into irrelevance. Yep, this is still made to the old Avon standard of good quality and cheap price, even if not especially sophisticated or attention-getting; but the kind of people who bought Avon for most of its time spent as a household name weren't looking to have their name in lights, either. Rugger is posited as the "working man's cologne" that works for you while you wear it. You might be asking yourself how it is supposed to do that when it's "just a cologne", which is when Avon hits you with the gimmick: No Bob, this isn't "just a cologne", it's a "cologne plus". Plus what you may be asking? Well Bob, I don't really know, because I don't have a GCMS machine handy and nobody had to list detailed ingredients in fragrances since IFRA wasn't goose-stepping all over the perfume industry just yet. Avon's back-of-box blurb states: "The bracing scent that goes to work the moment he puts it on", and then states that built-in emollients provide the added "plus" of skin-conditioning to the fragrance, which effectively makes this after shave in all but name. Unsurprisingly, Rugger almost wears like after shave, so you might as well use it to soothe nicks like one too.

The actual smell of Rugger, which is the whole reason to even consider a cologne that usually has no functional properties, isn't that bad either. Again, nothing to write home about; but this is classic blue collar perfumery sold to homemakers and their auto-mechanic husbands in the middle of Nowhere, Indiana during Sunday swap meets, so set your expectations accordingly. For the most part, this smells like a retread of Avon for Men (1949), at least in the basic fougère structure that prominently showcases lavender and geranium in equal measure. The note pyramid is a lot more complex than what's really going on here, as this doesn't open with much more than the aforementioned lavender, maybe some orange in place of Avon for Men's lemon. Rugger is a bit spicier too, with allspice and cinnamon playing with a touch of patchouli that sticks out early in the wear much like it does in Pierre Cardin pour Monsieur (1972). If anything, Rugger could be its more humble sibling, as like the Cardin, this Avon becomes mostly about the oriental bits in the base, with sandalwood meeting the patchouli of the heart, and benzoin leading into Avon's patent house amber. The fougère accord ultimately re-asserts and we end up with something more akin to a semi-oriental fougère, but performance is very muted thanks to the emollients replacing much of the alcohol usually responsible for a cologne or eau de toilette's projection over perfumes.

What we get here with Rugger then is a cologne (closer to an EdT really) with the sillage of a parfum instead of what you may be expecting, translating as muted intensity on skin like a cologne, but with the long-lasting nature of a parfum thanks to those emollients really sticking this to skin. Most guy then and now wanted colognes to explode off skin for better or worse, and didn't care if it fizzled out in a few hours because they only needed it to be noticeable long enough to bring a piece of the "action" home from the bar. If you were an office dweller that valued modest performance and politeness with long-lasting wear time. maybe Rugger was the thing for you; but in 1981 everyone was trying to be louder than everyone else. so that mindset was rare among the target audience. Otherwise, Avon surmised that there were guys out there in middle America concerned with the way alcohol-heavy colognes might be drying out their neck skin, so something like Rugger might appeal to them. Well guess what? There wasn't, and most guys who sampled this from Avon ladies bought it for the way it smelled, or were given it by those same ladies who were their spouses trying to offload overbought inventory for Christmas. Really, this stuff should have been advertised after shave/cologne, because that's exactly what it is, not "cologne plus". Avon even made a cream-based Rugger after shave balm to go with the fragrance, so double yikes. Once you get past all that hoo-hah, Rugger is a nice, competent fougère. Thumbs up