In the grand scheme of scents, Britney Spears' "Circus Fantasy" (seriously, what even is a circus fantasy?) is probably a lot less respected than the timeless "No. 5" by Chanel.
Lady Gaga Launches Fragrance: Fame
Celebrity perfumes: who is buying them and why?
Web2Carz Contributing Writer
Published: June 19th, 2012
L
ady Gaga released a perfume this week. Earlier this year, she promised it'd smell like, of all things, "blood and semen," which is pretty disgusting. Today, she's changed her mind, and the new description says it smells like "the tears of a Belladonna," (among other things), whatever the hell that means. The fragrance also includes notes of "dripping honey" (which is probably not different from still honey) and apricot nectar, but all we can really wonder is who on earth buys these celebrity fragrances?
Aside from Sean "P-Diddy-Puff-Daddy-Puffy-John" Combs, almost all celebrity perfumes are marketed to women.
The idea is simple. An A-list star (or, sometimes, a flailing B-lister) "teams up" with a fragrance lab, et voila: a signature scent is born. We have a few ideas of why these products exist and who buys them.
As a woman, this author has a little bit of experience with said celeb-scents. As a 19-year-old, having a Britney Spears-endorsed perfume in a bright-pink, bejeweled bottle isn't an embarrassing thing to have on one's dressing table. The key word here is 19.
Celebrity perfumes are typically slightly less expensive than "designer" fragrances, making them a little easier for younger people to obtain, and they are pretty much exclusively marketed to young women. With the exception of people like Sean "P-Diddy-Puff-Daddy-Puffy-John" Combs, almost all ofthe celebrity perfumes are made for women—even the ones "made" by men, and let's be honest—Justin Bieber isn't really thought of as a man's man.
Even in beauty stores such as Sephora, the celebrity perfumes are corralled to one side of the shelves, almost as if to say "These are the joke perfumes, the real stuff is over there.
Even celebrities like Celine Dion and Sarah Jessica Parker have perfumes, and despite their careers that cater mostly to older women, not pre-teens (Sex and the City, "My Heart Will Go On,"), their perfumes are still marketed alongside "real" perfumes that have names like "Pink Sugar"—not exactly an I-Demand-Respect name for a perfume.
The sad thing is that the celebrity perfume isn't a new idea, and it probably won't stop anytime soon.
The saddest thing? Bruce Willis' "Bruce Willis" fragrance. We can't imagine that was a good seller.
