The Unflabbergasted Genius

CHARLES HASKELL REVSON

The undisputed genius of the flamboyant world of cosmetics is Charles Haskell Revson, president of Revlon, Inc. From Charlie Revson's hard-as-steel mind spring the soft and alluring shades--Red Caviar, Pink Lightning, Plum Beautiful--that have touched the lips of more U.S. women than those of any other maker. Last week, at 53, trim (5 ft., 8 1/2 in., 144 lbs.), handsome Charlie Revson ran into some embarrassing new facial shades: Quiz Pink and Umbrage Blue. As sponsor of the rigged $64,000 Question and $64,000 Challenge--which in four years helped triple Revlon's sales to $111 million and boost its profits sevenfold to $9.7 million--Revson was the center of a controversy over what part, if any, he played in the rigging. Revson denied all, told a congressional committee: "I was flabbergasted."

WHEREVER the truth lay, the thought of Charlie Revson being flabbergasted was almost more than Madison Avenue and the cosmetics industry could bear. When it comes to business, Revson not only knows all the answers, he knows the questions too. To underlings and admen who do not know them, Revson is a merciless taskmaster. He has axed his way through seven different ad agencies in the past three years, rubbed off dozens of account executives. At one time his executive turnover was so great that people who stayed at Revlon a year, so the story goes, got together and had an oldtimers' lunch.

"He is a perfectionist," says a former employee. "He applies this rule to people as well as products and advertising." Revson pays attention to the smallest details, often spends weeks working out the right name or the exact shade for a new lipstick or nail enamel, personally selects models and approves their clothing. He even had his employees' telephones tapped to make sure they were doing their jobs right.

At least one day a week, Revson dons a white coat and roams through the company's laboratories, where Revlon this year is spending $1.1 million on research, more than any other cosmetics firm. His eye is so sharp that he can pick out the one imperfect lipstick on an assembly line of hundreds, his standards so high that he has been known to throw away $1,000,000 worth of lipstick because its shade was just a little off.

The son of a Boston cigarmaker, Revson moved to New Hampshire with his family, and, after graduating from high school, went to Manhattan's Seventh Avenue to work in a relative's textile business. He picked up savvy about fashions, learned many a lesson in feminine psychology. Revson noticed that women's nail polish was poor, unimaginative, and marketed as if it were kitchen paint. He decided to cash in on this failing by setting up his own business when he was only 25, got Chemist Friend Charles Lachman (represented by the L in Revlon) to turn out new attractive enamels in a wide range of colors.

Revson's pioneering was so successful that by 1935 Brother Martin joined the business. But Charlie Revson was and is the boss and the brains of the company. His obsession is finding a theme for every product before he begins manufacturing it, then keying everything, from factory through advertising to the counter, to a single appealing idea. "Theme," he says, "is my religion." A recent theme: Colors Unlimited, a collection of "fabuluscious" colors. He popularized the idea of matching lipstick and fingernail enamel, revolutionized the single-lipstick habit of U.S. women by playing up their changing moods, created glamorous and exotic names to entice women to buy. Not content with this, Revson has moved into proprietary drugs, men's hairdressing, shoe polish, now sells his products in 79 countries.

CHARLIE REVSON'S drive and aggressiveness have won him more enemies than he can count. Says a major competitor: "He is the lowest character I know." Brother Joe left Revlon in 1955. Martin departed last year. But Revson is as calm as the eye of a hurricane about the controversy that whirls about him. The owner of close to 30% of Revlon's stock, worth about $40 million, he lives a life of calculated elegance. He "themed" his five-room apartment in Manhattan's Hotel Pierre in gold and white, "so that I could wake up even on the grimmest days and have the world be bright and quiet." His Dutch-born wife, Johanna, and his two children, John Charles, 16, and Charles H., 13, live on a ten-acre estate in Rye, N.Y. Revson usually sees them only on weekends, rides between dwellings in an air-conditioned Cadillac with airplane-like reading lights. He golfs some, has taken up sailing.

But the chief and overpowering theme of Charlie Revson's life is his work. Says he: "My duty is to counsel, advise and state unequivocally: this is what we have to do to stay ahead."

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