Puig’s fragrance division saw a drop from 40 per cent growth in 2022 to 17 per cent in 2023, then down to 13.6 per cent in 2024, on a reported basis. Estée Lauder Companies reported a sharp decline in fragrance growth: 30 per cent in 2022, flatlining in 2023 and up 1 per cent in 2024. Coty fared slightly better, with reported growth declining from 18 per cent in 2022 to “low teens” in 2023, before a modest rebound to “mid teens” in 2024. [...] “After years of heightened investment, a slowdown was inevitable,” says [Aishwarya] Rajpara.
— Read more in How beauty should prepare for a fragrance slowdown at Vogue Business.
To me it seems the fragrance market is so oversaturated with new releases and brands it is impossible to keep up with it all as a customer. It is overwhelming enough that I have given up, so much that I just don’t shop or buy perfume pretty much anymore. No fragrance brand anymore has a business moat to protect it from competition these days, so it’s not hard to imagine sales being down.
Nowadays there are some good things and improvements in the perfume industry, such as independent perfumers. But, honestly I miss the old days when all the perfume would be in department stores and I meander through leisurely and could smell them all. It used to be easy to choose and buy a perfume. Now department store perfume quality seems to have gone down, is celebrity focused, and is all about being trendy.
I miss the old days too…
100% agree with all of this. The big houses would produce a new scent — no such thing as a battalion of flankers in the eighties! — every few years, and then about a year later, if they were going to invest in a brand extension, they’d launch the men’s version and the bath line, something I really miss. They took their time with them, and any normal person could keep up with the new releases. And now there are something like four thousand new scents every year, more than ten a day, and it’s impossible to even try a meaningful number of them, not that I really want to: there’s so little that’s genuinely new and interesting, because with that quantity, how could there be?
I agree with everything you said too.
So true. I bought Chanel 5 L’Eau at Macy’s at Christmas, seduced by the bean bottle,, or it whatever it is called, but wish I had gotten it in the classic bottle. The shape just doesn’t work in my hands and it rolls around on my dresser.. Should have kept the packaging and tried to return it, but oh well. Actually, anyone want to trade swap for something- I’ve probably sprayed it 3 times… Other than that , my perfume buying is pretty much read reviews, order samples from Lucky scent, and then neglect to buy a FB of anything. Mostly I buy some thing I have longed for. I did buy a small bottle of Casablanca from St. Clair Scents, after wanting it for years. I bought a bottle of Irisss, the splurge of 2024, from Fragrance X, after wanting it for years, and using up all the samples of it and the other Iris bombs I had, and pouncing on a very good deal. I bought a vintage bottle of Dune on E-bay, and was relieved to get a perfect bottle, from Romania or somewhere. I doubt if I will do that again, it took forever and was nerve wracking.
But classic perfume shopping expeditions with my pals seems to be a thing of the past.
Dune was one of my favorites in the 90’s.
My nose loves real ambergris, and the first time I smelled Dune, it was like a whole new set of olfactory possibilities opened up to my poor allergy battered sniffer. It is one of my three desert island scents at this point. 🙂