Confronted by hordes, companies tried preserving their images the one way they knew how: jacking up prices. In doing so, they followed the longstanding Veblen goods principle. Derived from the economist Thorstein Veblen’s “The Theory of the Leisure Class,” written in 1899, it states that demand for luxury goods will actually increase as their prices increase, because such hikes thin the herds and make scarce goods that much more desirable.

— Read more in Obscene Prices, Declining Quality: Luxury Is in a Death Spiral at The New York Times. (Note that the article is about fashion rather than perfume.) Hat tip to AnnE!