Paying too much for perfume? The Conseil de la Concurrence, a independent agency responsible for regulating market competition in France, has fined 13 perfume makers and distributors for price fixing:
The Conseil de la Concurrence said famous cosmetic brands such as Chanel SA, Yves Saint Laurent and Guerlain agreed with perfume chains Marionnaud, Nocibe and Sephora to have their products distributed at the same price in the three stores of the three chains, thereby preventing competition.
Marionnaud, which was bought last year by the AS Watson group, got the highest fine, euro12.8 million (US$15.2 million). LVMH's chain Sephora was fined euro9.4 million (US$11.2 million) and privately owned retailer Nocibe was fined euro6.2 million (US$7.4 million). (via Yahoo Finance, link no longer working, sorry!)
According to Forbes, LVMH, which was fined as both a perfume maker (Guerlain, Dior, Kenzo, Givenchy) and a perfume distributor (Sephora), plans to appeal the decision, stating that...
...the regulator 'has refused to take the demands and specifics of luxury goods distribution into consideration'.
In other news, Sean John Fragrances has been denied the trademark for Unforgivable. Read all about it at A Socialite's Life.
This doesn't make sense to me – for example, no matter where you buy Lancome products, they are always the same price. Isn't it up to the manufacturer to decide what price their products are to be sold at?
Just a brief rant:
Dear LVMH, owner of everything in the universe:
If Jacques Guerlain created it, keep your nosey little reformulating mitts off of it!
Thank you.
Well, sort of. It just depends on how they go about it. Here is a decent explanation of illegal price fixing:
http://www.michigan.gov/ag/0,1607,7-164-20942-44650–,00.html
I sympathize entirely, but would add my own caveat: If Jacques Guerlain created it, and it simply cannot or will not be produced today without reformulating, by all means, reformulate it. I'd rather have the chance of having at least some vague idea of what it smelled like than no chance at all.
I know not everyone agrees with me, mind you, but I wonder if we'd be seeing Vega & Sous Le Vent otherwise. And I'm very happy to see them on the market, even if only for a limited time.
Good point.
On my part, it is pure terror that after having Apres L'Ondee, L'Heure Bleue and Mitsouko in my life for decades, they will be snatched away, and I will be left to pine away with a bottle of Scotch and sniffing empty flacons.
But perhaps I'm too dramatic.
Can't wait to sniff Vega.
Sometimes I get the feeling that LVMH is the Borg: resistance is futile.
You'd think that with all that expensive development and advertising for Unforgivable that Estee Lauder would have set a little aside to check into the trademarking AHEAD of time. Maybe they thought they'd pull a J-Lo and use their influence and money to bully a smaller company into conceding it? I don't know… that's just really poor business manaqement either way. If little ol' Andy Tauer can remember and afford the effort to look into these things in advance, I don't understand why EL would not.
Or maybe they don't care if they have the trademark or not? I know nothing about these matters. L'Artisan did have to pull Extrait de Songes, but there are so many other perfumes with the same or very similar names that I don't know how it works.
And LOL at the Borg!
I know the feeling! Especially worried about Apres L'Ondee, which is in such limited distribution now
This is just another reason for me to NOT shop at Sephora.
LOL — if I was going to really avoid companies who fix prices, I'd be left without much of any place to shop. Most producers & distributors just drop retailers who don't adhere to suggested prices, and that is perfectly legal even though the outcome for the consumer is the same.