Firstly they put in all sorts of fascinating smells - this one smelled of coconut, for example - and I've had minty, tea-tree-y and lots of different fruits, as well as indeterminate smells that were apparently designed to represent the qualities the shower gel embodies.
This one, for example, was called Enliven. Some of the shower gels I bought in Germany had wonderful names. The Germans speak English very well, but perhaps they don't get the absurdity of plucking a word out of context. Perhaps they don't care, I'm not sure.
Anyway, I do find myself standing by the relevant shelf, comparing the qualities that the gels represent - Wake Up! Soothe! Excite! Relax! Recharge! Deep Calm! - obviously mining two particular strand, but I'm not sure how they achieve their stated goals, given that (to the best of my knowledge) they're not allowed to put narcotics into their products. It could go further - they could be advertised as promoting moral virtues - Fortitude! Reliability! though perhaps that's too Victorian for today's market.
I usually go for something that will wake me up, and often for the brand marked "for Men", as this implies that it doesn't smell of anything in particular, except some general gelly smell.
It's just that I want to pick something that suggests that I don't think to hard about this stuff, despite the fact that I obviously do.
I mean it's just soap.
What worries me, of course, is that despite the fact that there's the generic Supermarket brand (labelled "Shower Gel" and not smelling of anything in particular), I still place an unhealthy trust in the echt product.
The best one was mentholated and smelled minty. The menthol left one artificially cool and quite numb in parts, which was an unusual experience.