Beyond the Point(80)
Laura leaned her hands against the table, and Dani felt the energy in the room shift in her direction. She wasn’t bold enough to stand up, but she sat up straight and began using her hands demonstratively, the way she’d been taught in her West Point public speaking classes.
The computer finally came back to life, and Philip quickly advanced the slides until the photo on the screen showed an image of John F. Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe, and his wife, Jackie Onassis.
“What happens is, he cheats on you. He shops around. Tries different products. And why wouldn’t he?! If every razor does the same thing, with the same results, why not try a different model?”
The men chuckled and leaned back in their seats.
“You are not in a monogamous relationship with your customers,” Dani said. “If you want them back, you have to win them back. You have to make them love you again.”
She paused, thankful that the joke had worked. Jim Webb looked relieved, Laura Klein looked furious, but all that mattered was that Paul Duval was still listening.
“I met a guy six months ago named James O’Leary,” she continued, the screen showing a silent video of their morning in Boston. He leaned toward the mirror, making one long strip with his razor from cheek to chin.
“He’s a football coach. An all-American, middle-class guy, smack-dab in the center of your target market. You wouldn’t think he’s a sensitive guy. But he is. He cares about the athletes he coaches. He cares about the kind of men they become. For him, shaving is just another ritual. Like running. Like lifting weights. You don’t do it once. You do it day in, day out, to fight off decay. You do it to prove to the world that you’re still in the fight.
“Rituals give us a routine. They give us a grounding. Rituals give us hope.
“It’s our belief that male consumers are ready to be engaged on a level beyond function,” Dani said. “It’s not about how close the razor shaves, but about how that ritual prepares them for the day ahead. About how that ritual makes them feel. Not here.” She touched her cheek. “But here.” She pointed to her heart.
Images played on the screen in front of them, flashing everyday scenes: A man burning a piece of toast while his child screams in a high chair. A man stuck in traffic. A football coach on a green field, helping a player up off the ground. A soldier in BDUs, staring in a mirror, his face covered in shaving cream. Then the words they’d worked on for months came up on the screen—white letters against a field of black. Dani read the words aloud.
“Gelhomme Quattro. Your first weapon in the fight.”
THREE HOURS AFTER the presentation, Laura Klein, Jim Webb, and Dani were still seated at the conference table.
“Calm down, Laura,” Jim was saying, pressing his hands down on the table in front of him. His voice was quiet but insistent. “Dani was just trying to redeem the presentation.”
“It didn’t need saving,” Laura said, her voice several octaves higher than normal. Someone had shut the door. “My authority was completely undermined. As far as Paul Duval knows, I didn’t even touch that presentation.”
You didn’t, Dani wanted to say. But she knew better than to open her mouth; she’d already done enough of that today.
“They seemed pleased,” Webb said. “That’s all that matters. We’re moving forward.”
Laura grabbed her things and left in a hurry. Jim put his hands on his temples and shook his head.
“She didn’t know the slides,” Dani said, by way of explanation. “The way you looked at me, I thought you wanted—”
“You overstepped, Dani. It makes us all look like a bunch of bumbling idiots to Gelhomme. You don’t think they know you’re Laura Klein’s junior? You gambled with nearly thirty million dollars, Dani. Our biggest client. For most people, a move like that would get them fired. Of all people, I thought you would understand respecting the hierarchy.”
They sat in silence. Webb stared at the conference table, while Dani stared straight ahead, holding her emotions in check.
“Laura is going to expect an apology from you tomorrow. And it needs to be a good one,” he said, gathering his things. “You took a big gamble today, Dani. And you better hope it worked.”
IN THE MIDDLE of May, three weeks after the Gelhomme presentation, Locke Coleman emerged from the international terminal at Heathrow Airport, followed in close succession by two friends who had decided to join him on his trip to London.
“Holy shit, McNalley!” Locke yelled. “Since when do you drive a Land Rover?”
They filled the SUV with their suitcases, then pulled out of the airport parking lot, with Dani perched in the right-side driver’s seat. Locke sat beside her, running his hands across the beige leather interior.
“I got us tickets to Wicked for tonight,” Dani said. “It just debuted in the West End, so people are going crazy for it. And tomorrow, Portobello Road Market sets up right outside my house.”
“I’m just glad to be out of Fort Hood,” one of Locke’s friends said from the back seat. Will Chapman had strawberry-blond hair, strawberry-blond eyebrows, and a reddish face, trained toward the Thames River out the window to his left. Locke’s other friend, Joel Truman, had light brown skin and deep brown eyes that kept closing, pulled down by jet lag. Will punched Joel in the arm.