Fergie, Joe DiMaggio and Helen Hayes seem an unlikely trio – a current rock star, a legendary baseball player from the ‘50s and the “First Lady of the American Theatre.” The common thread? They’ve all partnered with Avon at some point in the company’s 126-year history. They’re three celebrities in a long list of film stars, singers and designers who have loaned their names, their cache, and sometimes their faces to the iconic company for women.
During the late 1940s and 1950s, the latter part of Hollywood’s so-called “Golden Age,” some of the biggest names in American stage and screen were featured in Avon advertisements, including:
Scents & Sensibility
Perfume was the first product Avon (then known as the California Perfume Company) ever sold, and has always been an integral part of the business. When it comes to scents, Avon has hit the high notes by combining the right notes and carefully choosing celebrity partners. Avon celebrity fragrances of decades past include:
Current Celebrity Partners
Today, Reese Witherspoon is Avon’s Global Ambassador, the company’s first, as well as the Honorary Chairperson of the Avon Foundation for Women. Witherspoon, Fergie, and actor Patrick Dempsey have all teamed up with Avon to create signature scents. In fact, the 2010 debut of Outspoken by Fergie was Avon’s most successful fragrance launch in the company’s history. The award-winning singer debuted her highly anticipated follow-up fragrance, Outspoken Intense, in 2011.
Other celebrities partnering with Avon today are actresses Salma Hayek, Zoe Saldana and Ashley Greene (for mark.).
Designers within Reach
Avon has had fragrance partnerships with international design houses Christian Lacroix, Herve Leger and Ungaro. By teaming up with such well-known and revered designers – whose names grace the pages of high-end fashion magazines the world over – Avon is able to offer luxury-brand fragrances at affordable prices. So customers – whose disposable income can't normally cover couture – can have a little Lacroix or Leger.
Back in the 1980s, Avon owned Giorgio Beverly Hills – one of the decade’s “it” fragrances, as well as the Parfums Stern business, with a portfolio that included Oscar de la Renta, Valentino and Perry Ellis.
On the apparel front, designer Diane von Furstenberg, best known for her iconic wrap dress, created a line for Avon called The Color Authority.
It's all about shooting for the stars and making the aspirational attainable.
Baseball legend Joe DiMaggio
appeared in Avon advertisements
in the 1950s
A 1952 Christmas advertisement
with Loretta Young
This advertisement with actress
Rosalind Russell appeared in
numerous women's magazines
An advertisement for Fergie's second
Avon fragrance, Outspoken Intense
Reese Witherspoon is Avon's first
Global Ambassador and also serves
as Honorary Chairperson of the Avon
Foundation for Women
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