Sadly, fragrance lovers are scared to trust their instincts, since the seductive bludgeon of commercial marketing has successfully indoctrinated would-be frag fiends into accepting the pink vs blue division. His’n’hers fragrances didn’t even exist until the advent of 20th century marketing, when perfume companies realised that they could shift twice as much product if they convinced customers there was a difference between smelling like a lady and a gentleman. Before then, a person was free to splash a flash of violet, or lavender, or rose, or eau de cologne, regardless of the equipment they were packing in their pants.
— Katie Puckrick would like you to reconsider your gender-based assumptions about fragrance. Read more at Exploring the relationship between perfume and gender at Vice.
Hmm not sure I follow the economic logic. So if you split the market in two, you can sell twice as much? Isn’t that actually counterproductive because you put in twice as much R&D and marketing for a same total of potential market?
Otherwise, I am not really seeing this in my bubble of the world. I find there is an ample unisex selection of fragrance for perfumistas (less so in the mall category but definitely so in the likes of CDG, Hermessence, Artisan, Atelier Cologne and such). And imho and quite unpopular opinion these days, there is no shame in having “pink for girls or blue for boys” either, some smells are more appealing to one or the other, just like food taste differs quite naturally (few men are as crazy about chocolate as girls are. reverse for beer) . I find the recent denial of any gender-based differences or inclinations or preferences to be maddening.
Well, there was discussion of this yesterday in the comments — men smelling fragrances, liking them, then not wanting to wear them after they found out they were marketed to women.
And will add, that was the discussion yesterday, but there are likewise many women who are not interested in trying fragrances marketed to men.
I see. But my point was more this… hey that’s a marketing gimmick, for people trying to make an easy choice. And it’s fine to have a marketing gimmick based on a heuristic or a mental shortcut most of us are familiar with . Buttcrack for men, angel wings for women.
I wonder if the author finds equally revolting splitting fragrances in day vs evening ones 😛 or office acceptable vs date acceptable.
We ‘all’ have a heuristic for what goes well in day and what at night, or whats skanky or not. If the god of marketing started exploiting that more, well meh, it’s just another way to sell.
The opening statement makes it more tragic than it is… a fragrance lover – the kind of fragrance lover here – is not discouraged by a blue or pink label more than it is of sawdust or cardboard in Dzing 🙂 and if someone’s new perfume clueless boyfriend wants to get their fragrance-fanatic-gf a gift perfume, it’s fine imho for him to trust marketing to pick a floral rather than a saddle leather.
Well, yeah, she’s writing for effect. But I think she just means c’mon ladies, try Guerlain Vetiver why don’t you. And she surely already knows that most perfumistas wear what they like.
Katie Puckrick is definitely in my top 5 People I Would Love To Have A Beer With. And yes I am a woman who enjoys beer 🙂
Sure, I didn’t say such women don’t exist. Just there are less of them compared to women who enjoy wine. Pretty sure there are a fair bunch of men with a sweet tooth too.
And that’s totally fine, good beer is good beer, good chocolate is good chocolate and someone who likes them, won’t let it get in their way the fact that it’s not marketed specifically for them. Unless they are in junior high I guess.
My 2 cents at least.
No hard feelings! I enjoy wine too 😉
To me, the downside of gender-based marketing is how easily it could discourage someone from trying fragrances (or other things) they might otherwise enjoy just because of the way those things are labeled.
Exactly.
I like Puckrick’s wit — I think the paragraph above could only have been written by her, along with the dichotomy “’for women’ (flowers and kitten whiskers) or ‘for men’ (woods and butt sweat).”
I still think “Chandelier” was a bizarre music choice for that Miss Dior video, as much as I think Portman’s awesome (and beautiful) in it. “Miss Dior — for when your life is falling apart” doesn’t seem like a tagline that would move much product, blue or pink.
It is odd indeed
I would imagine the purpose behind scents (for the masses, at least) changed throughout history also. As wealth has grown, specialization grows. I would have included Eau Sauvage on the list for a scent women should try, although I’d be happier if my husband wore it. (Am thinking about buying him some and then “borrowing”).
This does make me think of the time I was at Half-Price Books. They had a particular group of shelves labeled “chick lit” or some such name. It was hilarious. I had never noticed how much books written by and marketed to women had pink tones on the cover. A whole section of pink. And these weren’t romance novels specifically. They were simply books thought to appeal more to women. Someone at the store had a sense of humor.
I had Eau Sauvage in mind too!
Hilarious.
I wear ocasionally Mechant Loup that I got as a gift for my boyfriend 🙂
Years ago, I bought Merchant Loup (for myself.) Love it! ????
I will say my husband and I often have different taste in what we like on him. He likes Du Coq from Guerlain, which I dislike. I got him to wear Colonia, which I love on him. He rarely wears At The Beach 1966, which I also love on him. He also loves SMN original Eau, which does nothing for me. (We both like the various Hermes unisex ones)
Side note…he was suspicious of the SMN after he read Catherine de Medici wore it. I talked him down. Sigh….
I *knew* I loved La Puckrick. Now, with extra love.
I know this. And it doesn’t matter. My preference is still for “his”/or “unisex.” Generally speaking I don’t wanna smell like flowers (tho fruit or candy is OK). It’s just my preference. I don’t begrudge anyone theirs but I do get a lot of turned-up noses at mine.
Now that I think about it, I would love to smell Prada Candy on anyone!
I had to laugh this morning when I read that Tom Ford’s Fabulous won The Fragrance Foundation’s Luxury Women’s Fragrance of the Year. My giggle wasn’t due to the name, but rather because I recently found a tester bottle in the MEN’S fragrance department at Nordstrom.
Today I’m wearing Zoologist Camel. It feels perfectly wearable for anyone, though I imagine in the wider world it would be interpreted as leaning masculine.
Gendering inanimate objects is unnecessary. Developing (and expressing) a personal understanding of gender by explicitly (and accidentally) coding elements of our world as blue or pink or mauve is part of the human experience. It is one of the ways we attempt to simplify life and cope with the chaos around us.
At the same time I agree with Katie, “we’re needlessly denying ourselves the daily pleasures that make life worth living” if we don’t look around and step across the divide from time to time.
I am in love with her perfume suggestions. Eau des Merveilles for everyone!
Agreed, life does need some simplifications now and then – and as long as the line is not “hard” and “walled”, jumping over it is not that hard…
I wore vintage Caron Yatagan today and after about ten minutes I thought, “Gee, this would smell great on a woman.” It’s conceived and marketed as the manliest of scents, that of a rugged outdoorsman (fresh earth, conifers, galbanum and green herbs), but wouldn’t a lot of women smell good wreathed in the great outdoors?
And conversely, at least half of my collection is things marketed as women’s scents, but how impoverished my life would have been if I hadn’t felt free to wear and enjoy those fragrances over the years. I know the marketing would never allow it, but I wish we could just wear what makes us happy and to hell with our critics.
I love (love, love) Knize Ten, which I got for my husband as a sample. He didn’t love it for himself, but I will buy a FB probably in the fall.
I have also always loved lavender scents, which are apparently meant to be “masculine.” Pish tosh (boy, autocorrect does NOT like that phrase). 🙂