Perfume, once a true luxury product, has become, with a few exceptions, a mere commodity in recent years. Now designer and luxury labels and the cosmetics giants are trying to restore fragrance's prestige, notably at the high end of the market.
"Fragrance launches are more like movie releases or record launches," said John Dempsey, the global brand president of Estée Lauder. The Lauder company recently introduced Private Collection Tuberose Gardenia [...] "We felt we had to reinvent and recreate what fragrance is about", Dempsey explained. "When the business gets too big, we need to make it small again, restore the prestige back into the industry and take a more niche, specialty approach."
— from Perfume industry aims to regain prestige, in the International Herald Tribune. My question: can this approach work when everybody is doing it? That is, if the high end market is just as flooded with product as the low end market, isn't even expensive "niche" perfume "a mere commodity"?
You're right: even jacking up the price doesn't make something a “true luxury”. I'm reminded of the Agatha Brown tagline “The most exclusive and prestigious fragrances in the world” (http://www.agatha.com/products.htm). What nonsense! If I or any other schmoe can send her a hundred bucks and get a bottle of scent, then her fragrances are neither exclusive nor prestigious, by definition. Clive Christian comes a lot closer to exclusivity and prestige: his top-end scents are over $2000.
Patou's Joy used to be rare and precious and luxurious. Now I can go to a local drugstore and pick up a bottle of the EDT if I want it. It's not cheap (over $50 for a 25-mL bottle, I think), but it's at a drugstore, and I or anyone else can have it easily. Nearly all fragrances are mere product, like a head of lettuce or a T-shirt.
The way to make a genuine luxury scent: 1) Hire an artist to create the fragrance, giving her or him free rein, for that is what constitutes art. 2) Hire another artist to create the bottle and box, and make sure they use rare and beautiful materials. 3) Limit the number of bottles available: a hundred a year, maybe, so that most people cannot have it. Have a waiting list, or a lottery. 4) Price it accordingly.
That's luxury.
I have a completely different outlook, I guess. Look at MDCI — they followed your formula pretty much to the T. But there is so much product like that now — expensive, beautiful bottles, famous noses given lots of freedom, etc. Given that there is a new brand using that formula launching every month, why should I care? All it does is convince me that high prices & beautiful bottles don't mean a darned thing….they're a dime (ok, a $1000) a dozen. With the way the fragrance industry works now, limiting the number of bottles doesn't impress me either, it just annoys me — and it tells me that the company is just desperate to stand out from the pack.
To my mind, the industry is simply spreading itself too thin. The only answer I can see to restoring prestige is to produce less product (WAY less product), and that simply can't and won't happen.
The article talks about Chloe spending 4 months finding just the right ribbon. Ok, fine, but when you walk in a high end department store, and there are 10 new fragrances on the counter that weren't there when you last visited 2 weeks ago, are you going to notice the ribbon at all? I don't think so. Things like that mattered when product released at a slow enough pace that you could really pay attention to new releases, I don't see how it matters now. My guess is that Chloe would sell about the same with no ribbon at all. All that matters now, I think, is how the scent smells when you spray it on paper, for the first 15 minutes. There is hardly time for the average consumer to give a new scent more attention than that — why should they? Those other 9 new launches are still waiting to be tried.
*steps off soapbox and apologizes for rant*
I remember feeling very sad, the first time I saw a display packed with reduced-price fragrances; it was when they first started to buy in cheap stock from South America and other places where the goods were sold cheap. Until then, fragrance was always the same – high – price everywhere, and felt like something special. I genuinely like paying more for something that's hard to get – psychologically I feel like it's worth the expense! My local store had a range of cut-price l'Artisans last year, presumably because of the bottle change. I'd always thought of l'Artisan as having that niche exclusivity, but seeing them with red stickers kind of tarnished the lustre! Madness, I know.
Again, I'm in a completely different place. I'm cynical by nature, and several years of obsessively sniffing new releases has made me more so (or, has caused brain damage). The higher the price of the perfume, the more I'm convinced that the company simply *wants* me to think it is more special than it is. Granted, true art is hard to come by at under $30 a bottle, but there are plenty of masterpieces to be found for under $100, and when you get to $200 or above, the perfumes that strike me as worth the price are few and far between.
Distribution is a separate issue than price though. I would be thrilled to find a bunch of L'Artisans on markdown, but I don't want to see L'Artisan in Walmart. In fact, I'm disappointed to see them in the CO Bigelow chain, although I appreciate the convenience.
I agree, R. EL PC Tuberose Gardenia is a great scent, but: “We felt we had to reinvent and recreate what fragrance is about”? Not setting too high a bar, are they? When even the reasonably priced, democratically distributed scents like EL succumb to this kind of price=luxury thinking, it disturbs me. I wonder if bottles like the MCDI ones sell? You would think that the clientel MCDI would be attracting would be knowledgable, juice-focused customers would just find a way to buy the refill bottles.
You already know, but must point out that they aren't distributing the PCTG democratically — it isn't at the mid/low tier dept stores, only at a select few like Saks/NM. But in EL's favor, will also say that the scent is not at all unreasonably priced unless you need the jewel-encrusted parfum bottle.
And I don't think they have a choice but to succumb — if everyone else is doing it and you aren't, where does that leave you? That is the problem with the massive flood of product at both ends of the price spectrum over the past few years — it is really hard to step off the train. If you do, you are left behind. If you don't, you're part of the problem. I seriously don't see how fragrance will ever recapture its position as a prestige/luxury item unless somebody finds a way to strong-arm ALL the brands into drastically cutting back on new releases. And of course, that can't be done.
Can you tell I'm in “rant mode” today??
Robin, I'm with you on this one…the *only* way to bring back any sense of exclusivity to fragrance is to produce less of it, period. And being a cynic like you, I think that's simply not going to happen, ever, because at the end of the day, it is a business, and it's all about *making money*. What company would actually be willing to make less profit in the interest of recapturing the true artistry of perfume? I wish (oh how I wish!) there were one, but it's unrealistic. Still, we shouldn't lose all hope, because there are a few companies out there who have more or less remained true to their vision since the beginning, haven't brought out a zillion new scents, and have simply done their thing and done it well, with little regard to marketing schemes, etc. Penhaligon's, for example, comes to mind. Or look at Anne Pliska, who has literally had only one scent since 1985, though with its success (a cult success, but still) she certainly could bring out another if she chose. But basically, fragrance has lost its exclusivity because there are too many people, too much easy access to it, there's too much marketing, and the business is too big. None of that was true a century ago, or even half a century ago. Sad, but true, it is mostly “a mere commodity” now.
What crap. A ****ing ribbon! What about the actual product? Did they take ten minutes to pick a readymade formula out after fretting over the ribbon for months? I haven't tried it yet and it might even be good, but this kind of talk just makes my blood boil. I can't believe the number of people commenting here that they *want* perfume to be expensive and unavailable. This is just a sickness. I want it to be like Coke: a well thought out product, packaged sensibly and attractively, widely available, affordable, lovable, dependable. Even the greatest ever, Mitsouko, manages to meet the Coke standard, and I pray it's not going to change. My ideal universe has genuine Hermès silk twill scarves at the bodega for $50 a pop next to 15 ml sample size bottles of the best fragrances in the world at $25 a pop, and artisanal bread and cheese on the $5 sandwiches under the heat lamps. That's progress, not this misguided 21st century capitalist version of sumptuary laws. Beauty for all, every day!
Robin, totally agree with you and Kiki about the (tiresome!!!) flooding of the market with products. Must be a cynics thing because I am one too, and I couldn't agree more with your post.
And I, too, admire Anne Pliska for not flooding the market. Hats off to her.
God, don't apologize!
You're not wrong; the cheapening of scent goes hand in hand with its utter ubiquity. It's hard to get excited about most scents, it's true, because there are so damned many of them; it seems like not a day goes by without at least one or two launches, doesn't it?
But my point was that luxury is inevitably tied to rarity. You're right about limited editions; they mostly piss me off, too. I think what I meant to say wasn't that the supply should be artificially limited, but that the scent itself should be rare–that it literally wouldn't be possible to make more than a hundred or so bottles a year, in the same way that you can't just crank out twenty-carat diamonds or sable coats by the tens of thousands, like cookies in a factory. And yet even saying that, I'm not sure it would work: Clive Christian's massive price strikes me as not so much exclusive as merely insane (could any scent possibly be worth that much money?), and the limited-edition Harvest scents by L'Artisan don't make me desire to own them, or envy those who do.
There are still plenty of rarities in the world, and it ought to be possible for a scent to be an event–to be something wonderful and rare and desirable, like Almas caviar or a Ferrari Enzo. What you're proposing, I think, is that not just specific scents become luxury items (because some already are), but scent itself. That isn't going to happen, as you noted. There's no solution to it. We're drowning.
I find this an interesting topic, and I have so many different takes on it and feelings about it.
First and foremost, I would say that even “fine art” is (debatably) “a mere commodity” nowadays; numerous books have been written on this and it's certainly a longtime subject of discussion in the art world. That's why the whole “lost 'ART' of perfumery” argument is just tiresome to me — instead, I view it through a more democratic, “populist” lens, I guess. That is: “How wonderful that so many more people can enjoy and appreciate the pleasure of fine fragrance than ever before.” You can replace “fine fragrance” with any number of items that a greater number of people are enjoying than at any time in history (fine food, wine, travel, etc.). It's not necessarily “sustainable” (the whole world can't afford a “luxury” existence), but that's another story…
I would argue that a terrific bottle of scent doesn't need to cost more than $50-$75. Period. Anything more is just marketing and branding hoo-hah. If it makes someone feel “superior” to know that they're wearing a $200+ “niche” scent, well goody for them. If the juice actually smells remotely pleasant, then they get bonus points. (Same with people who think wearing expensive designer clothing or carrying a $3000 bag proves something; I guess I'd say 'If you have it spend it,' but doesn't make you a better person.)
I'm excited if I find a scent that puts me into some kind of rapture (long term or temporary), no matter what the price. Sometimes I even feel that way from sniffing a $6 bottle of rosewater. I guess the obsession with “luxury” is lost on me — even more so the idea of “exclusivity”. The truth is, if something is truly “exclusive”, I'm not even remotely near that demographic to begin with.
I think one of my core precepts comes from a book I read about wine, which said something like “if you truly enjoy screw-top Lambrusco with your hot-dog barbecue, by all means, ENJOY it”. In other words, it's possible to appreciate both Lambrusco and Mouton-Rothschild. Similarly, I would say that if someone truly gets pleasure from fragrances by Axe, Britney Spears, or a head shop patchouli oil, then hooray for them and the hell with the idea of “luxury.” And maybe there are people who enjoy Britney and also are Serge Lutens fanatics. Who am I to judge? Maybe a glut of product will make for more scent-savvy consumers overall (though, don't get me wrong, 800 new releases in one year is just plain overwhelming!).
Even CC, unless I misunderstand his advertising, isn't claiming the scent itself is worth so much — its the bottle. The ultimate in luxury, I guess: paying for nicer glass than the glass the masses have on their dressers.
Maybe the problem is that what I want isn't luxury at all, properly understood — I'm closer to Tania, below. I want something well made at a reasonable price. That is what the industry REALLY ought to be worrying about, if you ask me (and nobody does, LOL!) — the mid range of the market, which is 95% useless dreck. I mean, I wouldn't complain about 800 new fragrances if even 400 of them were worth taking the time to smell.
Hear! Hear! Tania for U.S. Beauty Czar! : )
Tania, I couldn't agree more. Bah to artificially creating “rarity” and substituting jacked-up prices for exclusivity. Bah, too, to dull, “safe”, ultra-marketed scents with nothing to offer in terms of real originality or personality. No wonder we're all getting a little cynical! The only silver lining is that truly beautiful, thoughtfully-made, distinctive, quality scents are still being produced and sold at reasonable prices; given the state of the rest of the market, these fumes stand out even more by contrast. There IS justice!!!
LOL — sorry, I've pretty much lost all hope. Anne Pliska is a good case. I mean, when you say “she could certainly bring out another if she chose”, I'm not at all sure. Why would any of the big fragrance & flavor houses give her any attention at all? Wouldn't surprise me one bit if AP got discontinued altogether.
And part of the problem is that I don't think a scent like that has even a vague chance of gathering a cult following these days. Back when I started reading the fragrance boards, little niche scents like AP were all the rage. People would talk about them for months on end. There aren't *any* scents, niche or otherwise, that can manage to capture that much attention now. Even a new Serge gets discussed for a few days or weeks, then mostly gets ignored as 20 new scents are launched.
See, I am such a cynic. I assume she has not flooded the market because she can't, not because she is more upstanding than everybody else. Of course, I have no idea who she even is, LOL, so just ranting…
Nicely said, T, and now I'm weeping for the $5 sandwich. I shouldn't be ranting so close to lunchtime…
Tania and joe805 get closest to how I feel about this. Though personally, I feel like the lines between art and commerce are always quite fuzzy, and that part of what interests me about perfume is that it has never pretended to *only* be art (the way that, say, fine painting sometimes does).
I do think that consumers are totally overwhelmed by the amount of product. Perhaps one way to restore a sense of luxury is to create more educated consumers. I know its been true for myself that learning more, trying more, has made the whole world of perfume come alive, as art, in a way that just didn't exist for me previously.
I give workshops on various topics and several of my friends have been asking for one on perfume — they love to smell things, they want to know more, but stopping by the local mall just isn't going to help them (and they're not quite as obsessive as I am about reading the blogs!). Certainly, the creation of more high end, out-of-reach scents isn't going to help them achieve a sense of luxury.
How's this for luxury–refuse to sell your product in a store until you've seen the SA's are properly trained, know what they're talking about, evince at least an *interest* in perfume and can give the consumers true feedback.
I'm not looking for a return to luxury, but I am bemoaning the “lost art of perfumery”. I don't think it is really true that “so many more people can enjoy and appreciate the pleasure of fine fragrance than ever before” — I think it is the opposite: it is harder and harder for the average consumer to find a decent, well-made fragrance in the midst of all the dreck on the market.
Ugh, don't even get me started on SAs, LOL…must go meditate now 🙂
I do see what you mean and I agree with you. There's definitely a glut of “dreck” on the market. Or maybe it's not even “dreck” (some is, of course)… it's perfectly “nice” and wearable juice, but then there are 10-20 (or even more) launches EACH YEAR of product that smells almost identical. It's like the recent Iris glut — how many different ways are there to tweak iris to make it stand out as “unique”?
I have to believe that all this product is just cannibalizing the same market — gross sales probably aren't going up much (except perhaps certain overseas markets), but everyone's earning a smaller share of the pie. And I think that creates a vicious cycle — jack up the price to TRY to earn more profit, but it doesn't work.
And it's come up here before — don't we all feel like we'd be buying a lot more product if it were available in 20ml-30ml sizes, instead of being forced to buy 100ml @ $125 upwards? I try holding out to never pay retail price, but some product just isn't available on eBay or on other sites.
It seems something will have to change — an industry cannot sustain year after year of 800+ new launches!
You raise a good question: how is the average person supposed to find what's good? We posters are clearly all fanatics: I don't know how many blogs and websites I read on the subject, I sniff absolutely everything that comes down the pike, and I can't keep up with it all, so how is someone who just wants a nice, interesting scent (something that isn't like everyone else's) supposed to sort through it all? They can't, and that's a shame.
While I'm at it, I must politely disagree with joe805 (above) on the issue of price. I love my little $6 bottle of Tabu and my $8 Old Spice and I do love a bargain, but, mentally running through my collection, I find that the ones I treasure most are also the most expensive: the $80+ Epices de la Passion set, the $100 Coup de Fouet, the $130 Ambre Precieux. Are they objectively worth that much? Maybe not. Subjectively, worth every penny, and more, for the pure joy they bring me.
Yep, the recent iris glut has just about convinced me that we've done all we can with iris, LOL…
Will be very interesting to see what we get over the next couple years. The industry seems to me to have changed drastically even in the very short period of time in which I've paid attention to it.
I'd actually love to know how “the average person”, e.g., non-addicts, sort through it. I hardly know any. Most everyone I know is either an addict, or simply doesn't bother much with scent at all.
Hey, that's an excellent idea: 10mL or 20mL bottles. Wouldn't that be a consumer-producer win-win situation? Economics isn't my strong suit, but on a purely practical level I know I'd be happily and enthusiastically buying more fragrances and probably spending more money overall in so doing. There must be a downside for the industry, but I'm afraid I'm not familiar enough with equations of commerce to see it. . .
I am a “budding addict” so up until I found your blog I was an “average person”. I've never gone without perfume, but I only own a couple bottles at a time.
I wore the same thing for 15 years (original Bill Blass, which I think they reformulated, damn them) with some variety thrown in here and there. If I tried anything new it was because it was a gift or I got a sample from a friend (or it was on sale, and I though why not). Honestly, I never paid much attention to the trends or the fact that so many perfumes were being released. But, in general I'm not a trend/status symbol driven person – so keeping up with the jones' just wasn't an issue with me.
I'd venture to guess the average person just buys within their price range and doesn't really notice the rest.
You're bringing up a good point about treasuring the more exprensive fragrances. In my opinion, the reason most of us here treasure the more expensive fragrances more is because they're simply better. I find that quality equals price, rarely ever do I find exceptions. That doesn't mean I can always afford the better quality product, but I sure appreciate it and the better quality it offers. At the same time, I am not a 'luxury' or 'brand driven' kind of consumer in general. As far as perfume is concerned, for some reason I've always liked the big old names in perfume the best (the Guerlains, Diors, Chanels, and the like), even as a teenager. I don't even bother to smell the glut of stuff that's flooding the market these days, it bores me to death. I hope this doesn't make me sound to snobbish, but it's just how I feel.
Amen to your request for smaller bottles. I'd buy more that way! With you I'm hoping the industry cannot sustain 800+ new launches per year. It is mind-boggling.
Robin, I think you hit the nail on the head right here. Perfumery used to be an art, sustained by the desire to create a wonderful product – quite unlike today's reason for flooding the market, which is money.
Please don't misunderstand and think that everything I buy is at a $50-$75 price point! Heavens no — I should be so lucky! However, I'm not sure the joy I get from certain scents is directly proportional to their cost — same way I'm not absolutely sure I'd get any more pleasure from a $200 bottle of wine than from a $50 bottle or a $25 bottle. And at least with the $25 bottle, I don't feel I have to “save” it for “special” occasions — and same with a reasonably priced perfume. If I owned anything that cost more than $200/bottle I'd be afraid to spill a drop!
I was just noting that there's absolutely nothing in a tiny bottle that — objectively, really — warrants costing that much. Same way I feel about a $300 CdG shirt as just one example — makes me laugh! That's why I'm (mostly) content to buy decants, used half bottles, and so forth.
Wow, 15 years! I think the longest I ever had a signature scent that I wore exclusively was about 4-5 years with Coriandre. And it has been reformulated past all recognition…
LOL – I wore Coriandre for years too, and thought I was the only person in the world who knew about it! I could only get it in one small obscure boutique. I haven't smelled the new formulation – I'm still treasuring the last inch in my old bottle. Come to think of it, I'm treasuring the last inch in a lot of old bottles – Parure, Laura Ashley Emma, Magie Noire. One day they'll 'turn' and I'll be heartbroken!
Oh wow there at least 3 of us in the world with a love of Coriandre! I'm off to France for a weekend soon and plan diving into all parfumeries I pass in the hope of finding some. I have noticed it's different from my memory of it though – sad. Like Rive Gauche. As for the main subject of debate here, I'll not repeat what others have said more eloquently than I but my views are close to Tania's. Now, off to find that sandwich..
A fan club of 3, not bad! It was a great scent.
When I was growing up, my mother and grandmothers wore one, maybe two scents at most. I think part of the prestige is lost due to the consumer…and I'm included in this. Oh how I wish I could say, “Thanks, it's Fracas”, when asked what I'm wearing. I'm trying very hard to find just a few signature scents.
Hmmm. You could be right, I don't know. I have no desire to limit my choices, myself.
I'd find that as limiting as telling myself I was going to stick with the same hairstyle or the same three or four pairs of shoes. Probably couldn't do it if I tried!