"See and hear me crying with laughter. Bay Rum smells like. . . I thought for ages it smells like Bicardi or Havana Club or Captain Morgan, funny, I know . . . But . . . quoting Justice Glaster its 'clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove clove . . . that's all you get!' Take it or leave it, just do not call it Rum and Bay, please!"
Humor aside, what Planet_X has forgotten is there's more to bay rum than just rum. The bay and spice are gigantic components that offset the liquor-like sweetness found in literally 99% of designer masculines these days. And Trumper's carefully composed Bay Rum cologne contains a green monster bay note (pimenta racemosa) that overtakes the composition only a few seconds after application. While the bright clove top note is impossible to miss, the bay steals the show. Thirty minutes later the drydown arc arrives at a soft rum that smells sweet (but not overly so) and unnecessarily expensive.
Trumper's scent accurately clones Pinaud's cheaper Virgin Island Bay Rum cologne, a favorite among wet shavers. So why all the hate for it in the fragcomm? This will always puzzle me. I suppose the bay note smells similar enough to the clove note that people think Djarum kreteks instead of the beach. It's the simple but sturdy smell of a fragrance that has survived countless world wars, pandemics, and disasters, and it now sits on my bedroom dresser in the early twenty-first century. Geo. F. Trumper's scent is a survivor, so critics should cut it some slack. I don't smell it and think, "Gee, the balance is wrong." I think of wooden ships bouncing across rough seas. I think of cowboys. Women in tight corsets. Queen Victoria. Dracula. The Industrial Revolution.
My one gripe with this bay rum, as with all bay rums, is it isn't loud enough for how good it smells. It's a skin scent after an hour, which at Trumper prices is not ideal. Regular reapplication isn't cheap at $25 an ounce, for 1.5 ounces. So a little more perfume oil in the blend is called for, although its longevity is acceptable at roughly three hours. It's yet another winner by a brand that knows its oft-overlooked customers better than they know themselves. The wisdom of age, I suppose.