"I shared it with Daniel [Patterson], my co-author. I did a cookbook with him, and he uses my oil in his food,” she told me. “But I didn’t have that much left, and I started to try and rebuy, and everything was dreadful. It smelled kind of like cat pee. It moves a little bit over and it’s just awful.” She spent 10 years on the hunt, sampling different crops, until she found the right kind.

If this happens to a perfume sold on a small, independent website, it’s a problem. It would be a disaster if it happened to a fragrance at Sephora, which was expected to sell millions of bottles every year.

— Mandy Aftel of Aftelier talks to The Guardian about the challenge of sourcing natural materials. Read more at 'All-natural' perfumes rarely are – but independent makers hope to change that.