Perfume no. 919 is a new fragrance from Bissol and Mobiado, specifically created for the "sophisticated luxury mobile phone user":
Perfume No. 919 is a clean, fresh, youthful scent with top notes of mandarin, juniper berry, elemi; middle notes of white musk, bamboo, oakmoss; and base notes of vanilla, cedarwood, sandalwood. (Mobiado Limited Edition) also has a special addition of Australian lime note, formulated for the elegant mobile phone user. Suspended in every bottle of No. 919, there lays a small piece of solid yellow cedarwood. Just like a bottle of fine wine, Perfume No. 919 continues to age over time by absorbing the natural oils from the yellow cedarwood. Each time No. 919 is used, its depth and complexity changes and continuously evolves to create a new stylish scent.
A 30 ml bottle is $300. Really. At that price, it seems reasonable to ask if that is 30 ml before they add the chunk of cedar, or after? (via gizmodo, quote via mobiado)
“specifically created for the 'sophisticated luxury mobile phone user'”
??????
!!!!!!!!
I CANNOT stop laughing and laughing and laughing. Oh god! I am still laughing. The tears!
How are the fragrance needs of a luxury phone user different I wonder, than those of us choosing non-luxury phones? What the effing hell is a luxury phone anyhow? Do the buttons purr when you press them? Does champagne pour out the receiver? Does it call my mother every week for me? I need answers.
I enjoy using luxury Egyptian cotton towels for the bath. Is there a specific fragrance for me, since my sophisticated perfume needs are different from those unwashed masses using plain old terry cloth?
*stunned silence*
Oh, come on, Katie, you know we unwashed normal cell phone users just can't comprehend the taste of the sophisticated luxury mobile phone user, who are we trying to kid here?
You get a chunk of cotton in your perfume bottle.
2006 is only halfway over, but I'll wager nobody will beat this one, LOL…
LOL at “unwashed normal cell phone users”…I use one of those pay-in-advance-by-the-minute phones, so I probably don't even qualify at that level. I just get a lump of coal in my bottle.
My husband says that at that price, the question it seems most reasonable to ask is: how long is it going to take to “mature”? I need to know how long I should be storing this thing next to my artisanal vinegars and 1961 Bordeauxs. And what about for those who wear elegant cell ear pieces? Maybe you could just stick the piece of cedar up your nose….
I would think a fragrance is better marketed for personal contact rather than the use of any device for remote contact, luxury or bargain.
I want something to wear when using my walkie talkie.
This is hilarious!! I guess you apply it directly into the ear, with a special luxury funnel. But if that cedar splinter falls into someone's ear, there'll be hell to pay. Bissol and Mobiado are imaginative little creatures, aren't they?
Just when you thought you've seen everything…just ridiculous.
My question is, at that price, how many minutes do I get with it?
This, without a doubt, gets my vote for the most stoopid!!!! fragrance release EVER. Not even removable rings on bottles can compete with this. Oouf.
Unreal! And perhaps misguided as well–I wonder how many men would spend this much for a perfume (especially if you discount the perfume-loving community, whose members are probably too savvy). My brother, for example, is quite well-off and deeply committed to conspicuous consumption; he is also addicted to a scent that used to be cheap but is now discontinued and therefore very expensive, and, though he keeps looking for it, he refuses to pay the sky-high prices. I don't think this will do well (but thanks for the laugh:)
LOL, all so true…
I am waiting for the first iPOD scent…
They really are imaginative. This is without doubt my favorite release of the year.
It is even funnier than the Stilton cheese scent. I'm sure there is more fun to come…
It really does deserve an award of some kind
I don't know about misguided…if what they wanted was publicity, and I suspect that might be the point as much as anything else, they've done very well. All the big gadget websites have picked up the story.
Oh, I see:) (Why I am not in marketing, reason 6413)
LOL — what I know about marketing would fit on the head of a pin. I'm just guessing. Many people expressed great surprise & disgust about the Stilton scent, but the Stilton cheese board managed to have themselves in the press for days on end, and in fact, I have yet to see the fragrance on sale anywhere. Perhaps it doesn't even exist except in prototype. If Mobiado wants to position themselves as *the* luxury phone, perhaps this will help their efforts? Of course, for all I know, they already are considered *the* luxury phone…I'm not in the market for one so I wouldn't know.
At that price, the bottle could've been more attractive. Comical concept, bottle, and laughable price. It almost seems like they're poking fun at the expense of their own target audience? Now that would be funny, brilliant even.
“sophisticated luxury mobile phone user”
This is brilliant.
1. Marketing MBAs at company splinter consumers into demographics and isolate the most desirable demographic, the one that spends the most money on silly crap: “sophisticated luxury mobile phone user”
2. Marketing MBAs at company try to find ways to improve the prestige of cell phone brand and reach this desirable luxury market
3. Marketing MBAs review b2b sales pitch from major fragrance composition company to create a brand extender fragrance to lend the line the aura of other luxury goods, such as jewelry and cars
4. Idiotic fragrance is launched
I am also honor-bound to note that the cedarwood ought to lie in the bottle, not lay in the bottle.
Yes, it does — would have loved to be a fly on the wall at the initial meetings for this one
Perfect.
So true, although I'm more perplexed at how they specifically designed a lime note that would appeal to a luxury phone user.
I think the bottle looks like a urinal.
OMG, you are so right!!!!
I am just barely reading this entry 6 years after the fact and times have changed for the worst during these past 6 years. 6 years ago many middle class Americans (albeit silly ones) could have wasted $300 on a bottle of perfume (not as a regular occurrence but more like as a special yearly treat or for a really special gift). In 2012, after the housing market crash, burst credit bubble, the Great Recession, and Occupy Wall Street, in what used to be a country of a number of poor people, the majority middle-class, and the select small group of high-income earners, has now realigned people into the 99% and the 1%.
Mobiado and Bissol’s advertising gimmick may have been a bit premature. What seemed silly in 2006 for a fragrance to market itself to “luxury mobile phone owners” is more like a rude awakening in 2012 and a stark reminder of the differences between the haves and the have-nots.
$300 for a sophisticated scent for luxury handheld-owners of which said handhelds cost anywhere from the thousands of dollars to $1million is chump change to the world’s multi-millionaires and billionaires. And in 2006, the average American could have looked at the perfume and laughed at its price, or seriously considered purchasing it. In 2012, however, the 99% are excluded from the advertising and marketing efforts altogether as it is targeted to the 1% and an impossibility for the 99% anyway as most of their money goes to basic necessities.
The fragrance industry as a whole has not slowed down even slightly on the luxury projects. They’re just rarely geared towards the U.S. these days.