t is easier to build a four-lane highway from New York to Hawaii than to know what women want, goes a popular joke. Mel Gibson was jolted twice with electricity in the movie What Women Want, and at the end of it he was none-the-wiser. Not the case with Whirlpool. Not epiphany, but advertising insights, it says, have helped it crack the code. So it is treading the path usually taken by detergent brands.

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