Purchasing a Scent for Professionals | How to Buy a Beautiful Perfume for Corporate Settings

Words by: Parfum Muse    |    Estimated reading time: 5mins 

 

While perfume can be intoxicating, evocative and sensual, there are also countless scenarios where we'd like to feel fresh, put-together and engaging without wearing an overpowering perfume that can become distracting.

Professionals often find that they need to balance the finishing touch a luxury perfume provides, giving them the confidence to approach a demanding day while ensuring they won't dominate a collaborative meeting with a heavy scent or lead with their perfume rather than their ideas. 

We’ve put together a modern buyer’s guide to subtle, clean, contemporary fragrances that can hold their own in any boardroom and ensure you make the type of impact you want to in a professional setting. 

Sectors and Work Environments That Command Light-Touch Personal Scents

Many of the best-selling scents and exotic fragrances become popular due to their opulence, distinctive profile, or intensity — ideal for a night out, celebration with friends and family, or date, less so for formal occasions, presentations, and conferences where you need to represent your business or brand.

Likewise, there are many well-regarded professions within which a loud, noticeable fragrance is considered a breach of etiquette; think legal representatives, teachers, doctors, and consultants, for whom discretion is an essential attribute.

In medical and food preparation settings such as catering firms, restaurants, fine-dining establishments and food halls, louder scents are typically frowned upon or may be banned altogether.

A complication is that, as all perfume connoisseurs know, one scent may appear somewhat different between two people due to the way fragrances interact with our body chemistry.

If you work or run a business where a strong scent would be problematic, it is worth trying your preferred fragrance first to ensure it remains subtle and confidence-boosting without creating too powerful a scent projection.

Of course, no such limitations exist in more creative and artistic industries, and you can wear any perfume that matches your personality, makes you feel energised and ready to tackle the day and coordinates with your outfit.

 Luxury Fragrances for Professional Workplaces

Generally, minimalist scents are a go-to since they work with any suit, formal attire, or casual outfit for relaxed team meetings. They can be layered depending on whether you would prefer a more notable scent to feel enterprising and confident or a quiet, defined scent that remains distinctive.

Below, we've collated some top suggestions from the Parfum Muse team:

Sedley Eau de Parfum by Parfums de Marly is a light, classic fragrance that blends bright florals like lavender and geranium with zingy top notes of spearmint and watery accord. This luxe perfume will also last all day without a top-up.

MyLO Eau de Parfum from Laboratorio Olfattivo is an elegant, bright scent with lemon, pink peppercorn and citrus top notes, balanced against white lily, iris and rose and with a vanilla and amber base that provides a delicate, lingering accent.

Delina La Rosée Eau de Parfum, another timeless scent from Parfums de Marly, is a floral-based perfume that is a little fresher than the signature Delina, with sophisticated pear, lychee and bergamot, undercut by peony, Turkish rose, and softwood at the base.

Le Parfum In White Eau de Parfum from Elie Saab is a memorable and fine fragrance. It features mandarin, red fruit, and orange blossom, along with sun-dried jasmine and peach, for a succulent, vibrant profile.

If you're heading to a workplace function, conference, or award ceremony, you might like to opt for a scent that is a little different and more intense than your usual day-to-day fragrance. Pick a sleek, sophisticated, and elegant perfume that ensures you feel poised and confident.

The Sunset Hour Perfume Concentrate from Goldfield & Banks is a great option. Its rich combination of citrus and spice features floral jasmine, coconut, and mango in the heart notes, which feel light-hearted and tart without being overly sweet.

Keen to make your office stand out with a delicate and refined scent that your colleagues will enjoy? Try a reed diffuser that will fill the space with a touch of fragrance — the Biancothe Room Diffuser by Laboratorio Olfattivo is perfect, with a classic cedar base, rose, and apple heart notes.

This scent is also available as a room spray to prep your work zone for an important meeting, discussion or brainstorming session.

Tips on Finding Your Signature Scent to Wear During the Working Week

Fragrances can impact our self-esteem, energy levels and enthusiasm, and a superb scent can act as part of your workplace ‘uniform’, whether you wear one or not.

Particularly if you work in a consultancy, advisory, or sales role, your signature perfume can become an element of your approach, helping you present a polished, friendly, and welcoming aesthetic, and ensuring your clients or customers feel comfortable discussing their requirements or asking you questions.

Here are some suggestions to help you choose the best possible scent for your workplace:

- Lighter scents are often the optimal option since they can be noticeable, pleasant, and attractive without having the power of richer, deeper fragrances that can feel intrusive or flood a smaller space—much to the consternation of colleagues or business users.

- Applying perfume sparingly is advisable. Two or three light spritzes will see you through the day. Overpowering perfume isn't necessarily a strong scent in many cases but has simply been overapplied.

- Be conscious of sensitivities and allergies, where people with conditions such as asthma can react to intense perfumes with ingredients like synthetics, musks, and aldehydes, which are common triggers best avoided.

Buying the best quality fragrance within your budget and steering clear of cheap or replica scents is important. A luxury perfume or cologne will contain the highest-standard ingredients that retain their scent profile and exclude low-standard chemical additives, which are often responsible for adverse reactions.

Fine perfumes, applied lightly, work brilliantly and give you a unique scent profile that feels subtle, professional and appealing while ensuring your favourite bottle of workplace scent lasts longer.