BBC Perfume Documentary

After having the lecture about perfume at FIT in New York I was unsure about watching this programme due to the extensive information that she had taught us already. It could of either been a repeat or it could've been as interesting as I found the previous talk.

The first hour-long episode called 'something old, something new' looked at legendary Guerlain, the founder/inventor of the perfume industry with a strong-standing business still running without use of advertising or modern press systems. It was interesting to learn more about the history of the multi-billion pound industry but overall, I feel the interesting information from this programme could've been shortened into a half an hour time slot as some parts really dragged on.

The programmes focused on the three major perfume capitals of the world: Paris, New York and London and I found it interesting to see the differences in the way the teams work and market their products. For example, Paris perfumers are targeting at a sophisticated lady who'll take her daughter to the same perfumers for the experience of growing up. America seemed more focused on creating a perfume which will sell a great deal and London wanted to create a never seen before marketing concept. However, all three used the same method of creating:

• Concept - To create a story that the customer can relate to.


• Scent - To create a scent that's new and exciting through infinite trials and tests and meeting with a perfume trend analysers


• Marketing - Combining the two above to launch a successful product that will stand out against the hundreds and thousands of competitors.

This method is similar to the FCP process that we have been taught.

The part of the whole process that I found the most interesting was the press launch in episode 1 for Tommy Hilfiger's perfume 'Loud'. Events and PR have always been of interest to me and I learnt from watching this programme that the main factors of a press launch are:

• Renting Space - a space that represents the product


• Decorations - in perfume they decorate with flowers etc that are used as ingredients


• Guests - you must invite celebrities to help endorse the product  in a suitable way

Overall I found the programme quite dull, especially episode 2 as it didn't need an hour to explain that smell evokes memories and I'm unsure if the reason it didn't captivate me quite so much is because it was slightly dated? I can see how some parts of the programme will be helpful with this module.