01Introduction
Generally speaking, there are these three categories of fragrances based on the market itself. They are different in several ways, such as in their position in the market, their price, their goals, their smell profile and a few other things you may want to note.
02Dupes
Dupes are perfumes that have attempted to copy another fragrance that is often considered an expensive one to try and make it available for the general public. They are frequently cheap and are priced between 25€ to 50€. Some can be as high as 125€ but those are rare and considered high end dupes.
Dupes generally tend to transcribe two types of fragrances in the expensive range; the mass appealing and the popular. This is because those are the types of fragrances that have the highest demand. If a dupe smells like the most popular trendy vanilla fragrance currently being used in the world, then the sales for its dupe will be considerably higher than if they tried to copy a fragrance that smells like wet pine that a total of about 3 people heard of.
Another thing dupes tend to do is embellish a little. I think as a way of compensating for not being able to get the formula 100% right, they will emphasize certain parts of the fragrance instead; which can range from increasing the longevity and projection with fixative molecules, to using generally liked molecules that might make the fragrance sweeter.
To give you an example of them, there are brands like Lattafa, Armaf Afnan, and Zara. The first three are from the middle east, and have a relatively good history with dupes and made some pretty good copies. Zara, too, has “borrowed” a few ideas from other fragrances, but I find that with their perfumes, the aforementioned compensation is the most prominent. As a matter of fact, in the last 6 months I have been smelling Zara’s dupe of Vanilla Powder from Matière Première, which is supposed to smell like powdered coconut and vanilla, but Zara’s version smells like a blast of synthetic vanilla combined with the smell of a Victoria secret coconut body spray that projects too well and stays on for (too) long. It is also sweet enough to cause headaches (especially in the summer when people decided to use this the most for some reason).
With dupe houses (the fancy way of saying brand), they will often have fragrances that are not technically dupes but are labelled as “inspired by.” Whenever you hear those words, translate them to simply “An attempted copying of a fragrance that went wrong but smelled good enough to sell;” because that is what you end up smelling. Additionally, they dupe houses can sell fragrances that actually are original. These will also be within the same range, and with the same intention of being mass appealing. Essentially, these are like cheaper and less market-tested designers.
Overall, if you want to smell good for cheap, and don’t care for the name of the brand of your perfume, nor about the artistry behind it, reach for a dupe. It’s quite easy. Just make sure to do your research about how the actual perfume smells on you first.
03Designers
Designers are fragrances designed by houses that have horizontally integrated themselves into the perfume market. They include houses like Dior, Prada, YSL, Hermes, Versace, Marc Jacobs and so on. They are priced around 80-150€, and attempt to appeal to the general public as much as possible, which I will talk about first:
If you notice, these are the fragrances that you find at every airport, and on every perfume ad. They are marketed towards the masses in both appeal through associations with something luxurious and through. The appeal comes from the brand name, as it is something pushed forward, often more so than the smell of the fragrance itself, especially through advertising; while for the smell itself, they have a tendency to use ingredients that are inoffensive and mass appealing: think vanillas, ambers and ambroxan.
These are the perfumes an average person in middle class has I think. They don’t care too much about the artistry, but they smell good and this is why.
04Designer Private Line
This is an extension of designer brands, but they are more akin to niche perfumes. This category tends to use higher quality ingredients (which is often what they pride themselves for), and feel less intended for mass appeal. They can range from 200-600€.
Dior and Guerlain are my particular favorite in this category followed promptly by YSL, as some of their creations are truly amazing. Tobacolor – a fragrance that is frequently mentioned on this site, as it has made it to my Favorites Chapter 1 – was made by Dior and is sold in its private line. Guerlain has a private line that really embodies quality than anything else. They have masterful use of rare and extremely high quality ingredients which is blended flawlessly.
Of course, there are other private lines, such as the very popular Luis Vuitton private line, as well as Versace and so on. These, I find to be more boring honestly; they may have a few fragrances that stands out in its creativity, but other than that, you just get more expensive designers with better ingredients and that is it, which is quite unlike the ones I mentioned above (especially Guerlain and Dior), which usually have an idea or an honest inspiration behind every fragrance.
05Niches
This category is the one that I would deem as the most creative of the three. When it comes to niche perfumery, the perfumes are expected to deviate from mass appeal and try to achieve something that is different. Niches can set you back anywhere from 100€ to 600€, with most of them being in the 250€ range.
Because with niche perfumery, the focus shifts from appeal to creativity, you will start seeing the use of more exotic ingredients and notes, such as incenses, herbs, oud and a lot more. This allows a person to explore stuff that doesn’t exist in the designer market and buy a perfume that suits them more personally. The idea shifts from “smelling good” to “smelling like yourself.”
You will also notice agendas with each house: most brands in this area will be unique in what they do or how they do it. The houses each try to achieve something different with what they can and the results vary extravagantly. If you think of Nasomatto, a house run by Alessandro Gualtieri, then it is the epitome of divisive: they have perfumes that replicate the smell of metal, or the smell of quality hashish, or the smell of fungi, and so on. Then you have a house like Akro, which has a line specifically designed to smell like addictions: the addiction to smoking (“Smoke”), sugary stuff (“Bake”), chocolate (“Dark”), sex (“Night”) and coffee (“Awake”). This vast difference in agendas will be seen in most houses in the niche category.
In recent years, I feel it is important to mention that some houses from the niche category decided to start going in the direction of mass appealing while only leaning on the title of being niche as a crutch to penetrate the niche market; selling uncreative perfumes as creative ones for the price of 230-500€. There are two main houses that come to mind when I say this, those being Creed and Parfums de Marley. Maybe just keep this in mind.
06Ultra Niches
This is a category that I did not mention in the title but felt necessary to talk about regardless. It is a category of pure artisanal work, and art. In this area, the fragrances stop all attempts of smelling good, and they try to smell of a certain something. An idea, a memory, a concept, a painting. It is interpretive work. In this category, you will come across some out of pocket smells, out of pocket notes, and out of pocket perfume bottle designs.
These are truly not owned by everybody, and are often limited to a few pieces total. A few examples I would be inclined to list is Adar and Adi Ale Van. You can read more about Adar in my Scent description – Houses page to get a better idea of what I mean here.
07Conclusion
To conclude, you have dupes, designers and niches, and each of them belong to a separate market, have separate intentions, and achieve different things. Now that you know the gist of it, I feel you should be capable of going into the world and forming your own opinion – or expanding on it if you have one – regarding what you like and what you don’t; what you want to smell like and what you don’t.
The world of perfumes is vast, and it keeps getting bigger, so go out there and smell whatever it is that you want to smell! And if you’re ever too worried to start, then the people in the shops are always pretty kind and offer you help (this is especially true for the perfume nerds who work in niche stores). Trust me, it is pretty fun.