• by October 6, 2008

Last hockey season, via word of mouth and the blogosphere, the revelation began to spread: Washington Capitals superstar Alexander Ovechkin, who had just signed a $124 million, 13-year contract, was still getting $14 haircuts at a local outlet of the Hair Cuttery chain!

At around the same time, of course, fellow D.C. celeb John Edwards' $400 hair stylings were generating even bigger headlines--and not the sort that appealed to, let's say, hockey moms and dads.

By the end of the season, Hair Cuttery had signed its most famous customer to an endorsement deal. The "OvieStyle" was thus born--and o on Monday, with a new hockey season about to begin, the puck dropped on a six-month ad campaign from Baltimore's TBC Advertising & Public Relations.

The online and outdoor campaign features such taglines as "Most Valuable Haircut," "Alexander the Great Haircut" and "What He Is To Hockey, We Are To Hair."

Hair-Cuttery's first-ever banner ads, on such sites as sportingnews.com and digitalsports.com, lead users to the retailer's first microsite--www.oviestyle.com. The site features behind-the-scenes videos and images of Ovechkin at his Hair Cutter photo shoot, hockey tops, grooming and hair care advice, wallpapers and more.

Outside, ads are running locally on the sides of Metrobuses, on bus shelters, and concurrent with 36 home games at the Verizon Center, via a mobile billboard that will cruise the streets around the arena.

According to TBC Chairman and Creative Director Allan Charles, Ovechkin "has a personality that really appeals to the everyday sports fan. He may be a multimillionaire, but he still appreciates a good haircut that's affordable, and doesn't take more than a half-hour out of his schedule."