The Nose Is Not My Favorite Organ

Is there any room for growth in the fragrance industry? After all, time after time we hear that we have exhausted our creativity and are unable to create anything new.

But who needs creativity anyway? If God had wanted us to be more creative, He would have given us more ingredients with which to work. There’s a limit to what you can create with a handful of aromatic flowers, barks and animal glands. There’s a limit to what you can create--but not what you can market! As it is, we have to create chemicals that help fill in for the pitiful lack of naturally fragrant raw materials. Or we could tell consumers that aldehydes grow wild alongside the roadways of Madagascar or talk about the spring harvest of benzyl acetate. And didn’t God give us the mainstay of all perfumes— diluants?

But this is neither here nor there. Our industry may be the most creative of all! How else can you account for the fact that perfumes were created originally? Can you begin to imagine those primitive times when mankind was reduced to rubbing themselves with herbs or sticking flowers in their clothes? Now we can rejoice in the realization that there are fragrances in a whole host of products: cleansers for the body and hair, deodorants, skin creams, douches, candles, baths, floor wases, window washes, toilets, air fresheners, lipsticks, insecticides, stationery--the list is long. Yet obviously not long enough, because we are being challenged constantly to make the list longer.

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