I believe that every person, regardless of gender, is a complex mix of what we in the Western world see as traditionally masculine and feminine qualities. Each person has a little bit of each type in varying degrees that are an outcome of environment and genetic hard wiring. Take me for instance, I love to watch any television show that includes the word “Housewives” in it (except for the Real Housewives of Miami, that business is unwatchable). I am also a diehard soccer/football fan and can watch hours of it as easily as I can watch a Real Housewives of Orange County marathon. Like my questionable taste in television programming, my admiration for Portuguese soccer player, Cristiano Ronaldo, taps into both sides of my persona. He is super good looking in a very polished way, but is able to back it up with talent on the pitch.
So you can understand my excitement a couple of years ago when Mr. Ronaldo announced that he was manufacturing his own line of underthings, under the moniker “CR7” (Cristiano Ronaldo, and his jersey number is 7). The line actually is a partnership between Mr. Ronaldo, JBS (a Danish underwear manufacturer) and New York designer Richard Chai. Nonetheless, Ronaldo is the public face of the line.
Throughout my European travels, I’ve observed that the line is a mainstay at the many department stores I visited to 
shop for Euro undies. The CR7 line was everywhere. As I understand Cristiano doing underwear would be akin to a Tom Brady/Jesus got mash up putting out an underwear line. He’s THAT popular. Some might say god-like. As popular as Mr. Ronaldo might be, it still comes down to the goods. It still has to be functional and comfortable and all that good stuff, or a bunch of folks wouldn’t plop down their hard earned coins, no matter who is on the box.
So with all of this in mind I decided to log onto Amazon to check out what was available. I tried the CR7 website itself, but it seemed like I would need to enter into some sort of agreement to have them shipped to the U.S. Underwear shouldn’t be that much of a hassle. I ordered a pair from Amazon, via Freshpair, but also ordered several other interesting pairs at the same time from different stores. Which is why I didn’t order from Freshpair directly. Maybe the CR7s would have been delivered more quickly if I had ordered directly. I ordered two other pairs of underwear related items through re-sellers in the same order and they both arrived two days sooner.
They are packaged very attractively, with a black and white photo of Mr. Ronaldo sporting the goods himself on the front. I ordered a size small, pima cotton “luxury brief” in a soft grey color. Partly because everything else that was available on Amazon was absurdly expensive. Upon unwrapping my very own pair of CR7s, I immediately noticed the waist band that had “Cristiano Ronaldo” attached front and center on the band in raised, rubberized letters. That seemed like a nice, luxurious flourish. However, in terms of the overall look of the garment, the rest of it was rather basic.
It seemed well made, with even stitching and no loose threads. The cut was a little boxy for my own taste and what I look for in a brief. My impression is that the brand caters to the mass market, so I assume that if they were cut any skimpier, they wouldn’t sell as well. I wore them all day on a Saturday, so that entailed running errands, sitting and watching tv, and going out to a movie and they held up well. I didn’t really notice them—which coincidentally pretty much sums up how I felt about the briefs, eh.
I paid about $19 for them before shipping.
All in all, the CR7s luxury brief might be a nice upgraded basic for the mass market at large, but at the $19 price point, I’ll take a pass.
