By the Hair

Henry Albert Bauer, manager of the champion Baltimore Orioles, has a chest like a Santa Gertrudis steer's.

His smile resembles a rock slide, and "Play ball" are only two of the four-letter words that the rugged onetime Marine master sergeant knows well and uses often. So is that really Hank Bauer on television nowadays, spraying his spikelike crew cut with Ozon Hair Spray from that pink and grey can?

You bet your pompadour it is. And if Bauer isn't enough, the Mets' Yogi Berra and the Yankees' Joe Pepitone go through the same toilette. Each of them, purrs an unseen announcer, is "one of those sissies who uses his wife's hair spray." The one-minute commercial ends with a reminder that Ozon is "the family hair spray that leaves your hair feeling like hair."

The commercial was dreamed up by Ted Bates & Co., the Manhattan agency that got the Ozon account after the Borden Co. bought Ozon Products, Inc. last year. Trying to get men by the hair, the agency sought males who were, in an ad man's words, "unassailably masculine" to pitch for Ozon. In view of the fact that 90% of sprays are still bought by women, another hope for the commercial is that women viewers will sit up and listen when they see such manly ogres as Bauer and Berra.

Just what this is going to do for sales is still uncertain. The ballplayers claim to be pleased in spite of the ribbing they are bound to get. Yogi Berra, who previously had plugged products such as Puss 'n Boots cat food, insists that he uses the spray three times a week. "What I like about it," he explains earnestly, "it isn't greasy." Bauer is equally enthusiastic but not quite so faithful to Ozon. "I've used it once or twice since making the commercial," he says. "I keep my hair short, sure, but it's a help just the same."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.