He's the creator of an American icon as familiar to us as the ears of Mickey Mouse. But, instead of cashing in his chips for dreaming up the advertising campaign for Absolut vodka, spirits-grandmaster Michel Roux is up to it again. With his new beverage-marketing company, the Paramus-based Crillon Importers Ltd., he has big plans to make names for other premium liquors, although ones that he's developed from scratch and bear the name of his company.

Take Elisir du Dr. Roux, a 94-proof herbal liqueur that's been touted as "nonprescription Viagra" - an apt tonic for this time of year. Seven years in the making, it's a bracing medley of distilled botanicals, herbs and spices, in keeping with Roux's desire to concoct spirits, liqueurs, wines and non-alcoholic beverages with health benefits. "I want to include more than just the alcoholic kick," says Roux (Roo), 60, who resides in Teaneck, NJ, when not combing the planet for exotic ingredients.

When the doc said his daily intake of wine was going to kill him, Roux created one that was as good for the heart as it was for the soul. Working in his favorite laboratory-the south of France-Roux dreamed up Le Vin du Coeur ("Wine of the Heart"), a Provencal rose packing five times the number of polyphenols, the wonder chemical in wine known for dredging blocked arteries. Roux is also experimenting with organic wines, for those allergic to sulfates. And, he has teamed up again with V&S, the Swedish drinks company that created the Absolut bottle, to market OP Anderson, one of Crillon's Aquavits - a sublime concoction similar to a premium vodka. Roux would like to see it become all the rage.

Part alchemist, part carnival barker, part romantic, Michel Pierre Roux knows that of which he speaks. He left France for the States in 1964, landing his first job washing dishes in the kitchen of Houston's Rice Hotel. Before long, he was managing nightclubs and even owned a few Texas restaurants. He began his career as a salesman for Carillon Importers Ltd. in 1970; 11 years later, Roux was crowned president and CEO, a vantage point from which he rode Absolut into our collective consciousness. (He was later summoned to salvage the flagging names of Stolichnaya vodka, Grand Marnier and Bombay gin.)

"We were told that the Absolut project was doomed, and we should not get into it," says Roux, his dialect thickened by his native French. "The bottle was shaped like something you'd find on an episode of M*A*S*H. And it had no neck, so it was hard for a bartender to pick it up. The label was in the glass, different from a paper label. Besides, Sweden was known for blondes, not vodka."

Although known for his marketing touch, Roux is also a respected philanthropist, having given in the name of causes such as child-abuse prevention and the arts. Both France and Sweden have presented Roux with its top civilian honors for his generosity. He lives by the motto "Doing well by doing good." "You can't drive three cars at once," he says, "so, you share with others who aren't as lucky as you, no?"