The first celebrities were big A-listers. Now, pretty much any celebrity, whether they be an actress, a performer, a musical artist, whatever — anybody who’s had some sort of even minimal career highlight in their life — the next thing they say is, ‘I need a fragrance,’ because it’s part of brand-building.
— Catherine Walsh of Coty, talking about the B-list celebrities (presumably the ones without licensing deals with Coty) who launch perfumes these days. Read more at From Chanel No. 5 to Britney No. 11 at the New York Times.
it’s a shame they dont print how many bottles of each thing were “published” so to speak:) I think it could say a lot about what’s the B list
Or about poor planning, though…I’m sure many of these launch with unreasonably high expectations.
Well, marketing is what it is. I saw a part of an episode of Jersey Shore once. That was enough for me. It wasn’t even remotely interesting. Now that I think of it, and on the same note (no pun intended), did Anna Nicole Smith have a fragrance?
I honestly can’t remember. She might have.
Honestly, for a quite a while now it’s been B-listers or teeny boppers, not the “serious artists” or people with gravitas, who put out a scent. Yeah, Halle Berry’s an Oscar winner and all, but mostly it’s Kardashians and Biebers.
I would think doing a Coty Prestige launch of some fruity thing in a cute bottle is a signal that you are NOT a force to be taken seriously, frankly. Someone like Anne Hathaway would be coming down in the world if she put one out. Among musicians, it’s pop artists, not Florence Welch or Neko Case (and OMG, I think I would actually buy a Neko Case perfume!).
Would you really want a boy toy like Beiber to have gravitas? (I just wished his fragrance were tolerable).
I’m not sure I would call Madonna, or Lady Gaga or Taylor Swift B listers, whatever you think of their talents, they clearly are major starts. (As for Ms. Welch, I can just imagine her neo bohemian scent, lush with an edge maybe like CDG WHite- Elizabeth Arden please send me a royalty check for the idea).
Madonna is definitely an exception! She’s one of the few genuinely major names to launch a perfume.
Taylor Swift — maybe will have longevity as an artist, but as of now her fan base is mostly little girls, no?
Anne Hathaway was the face of the Lancome flop Magnifique .
Maybe that’s the difference between A list and B list – being “the face” of a fragrance versus putting out your “own” fragrance. 😉
I think that’s exactly the difference. Keira Knightley doesn’t do a fruity-floral called Keira and a bunch of flankers; she fronts for Chanel instead.
Bottom line is SALES.
A list sells, B list flops. YMMV
Perhaps most celebrity fragrances are not very different or impressive, but I think we in the perfume “community” so to speak are a little hard on them. Sneering at them and letting the image of the person who released it taint how we feel about the juice itself. I’m happy so many people have the opportunity to create fragrances, A list or B list or even nobodies sitting in their homes playing with perfume oils… I think it’s a form of expression that everyone should have access to if they want to. It’s just a shame that so many celebs say they want a fragrance and then have no interest or input in the final product, which shows a lack of respect for the art form… THAT is what’s most disappointing imo.
Is there a reason any of us should expect a great fragrance from someone who appears in a reality TV show that features irresponsible and distasteful behavior such as binge drinking, excess cursing, and illicit sexual activity. Unfortunately, for me, knowing that a perfume is part of “branding” a particular celebrity kills my curiosity about smelling the fragrance. It is a complete deal killer. If the perfume brand is based upon an individual, then I need to have respect for the individual in some way before I can get interested in the product.
Anchor, none of these a or b listers list in a lab and mix oils, so for me it’s not their creation neither an impression really. They are just the faces of the fragrance. I wouldn’t blame people that they want to use their five minutes to make money but a lot of them talk crap about not wearing fragrance before because they hadn’t found anything interesting, but now all of a sudden they “make” fragrance that’s truly theirs and speaks of their personality, blah blah. And one more thing, i do mind when a lot of magnificent fragrances disappear from shelves and become discontinued because the sale isn’t great enough, so they make a space for tons of shapeless, senseless, predictable, bland, cheap smelling items that i couldn’t even use as a toilet air freshener.
Sit in a lab, sorry for misspelling.
Excellent parenthetical comment, Robin.
🙂