heir names evoke two-button Botany 500 suits and martinis sipped in a 707’s front cabin: Eau Sauvage, Habit Rouge, Pour Monsieur. And although sales are a fraction of the overall market for fine men’s fragrances in the United States, experts in the field acknowledge their lasting relevance. “They’re like benchmarks — anything that comes after is almost always a direct descendant,” said Grant Osborne, founder and editor of Basenotes, a Web site for perfume enthusiasts.
Chanel Pour Monsieur, introduced in 1955, “should by all rights be sitting under a triple-glass bell jar next to the meter and kilogram at the Pavillon de Breteuil as the reference masculine fragrance,” wrote Luca Turin, the biophysicist and olfactory scholar and an author of “Perfumes: The Guide” (Viking, 2008). Christian Dior’s Eau Sauvage, introduced in 1966, revolutionized the men’s category as the first perfume to make heavy use of hedione, a synthetic analog of jasmine; Guerlain Vetiver, based on the aromatic grass and introduced in 1961 after similar scents by Givenchy (1959) and Carven (1957), continues to beget modern iterations like Grey Vetiver, by Tom Ford.These classic men’s fragrances “left very long-lasting impacts on how people develop perfumes,” said Eddie Roschi, a founder of Le Labo artisanal perfumery in New York. “You look at what Guerlain did with vetiver, and so much of it has been copied. In some countries you can smell it in the subways because everyone wears it.” (In Europe, the classics still sell as if it’s 1969; last year Eau Sauvage was the third best-selling men’s fragrance in France, according to the NDP Group, a market research company that tracks sales in department stores.)
The vogue for all things retro is a marketing opportunity not lost on perfume makers. Christian Dior promoted Eau Sauvage with a print and television campaign built around a 1966 photo of the French actor Alain Delon. (The music for one commercial was a snippet from the theme of “Mad Men.”) In an age when hip young people transformed the flat-lining Pabst Blue Ribbon and Parliament brands into winking fashion statements, it makes sense that artifacts like Eau Sauvage and Habit Rouge might follow.
Indeed, the venerable Old Spice has been brand-extended so deftly that most younger users are probably unaware that the formula dates to 1938 or was derived from a women’s perfume.
Last year, the flagship Old Spice line, including the original aftershave in a buoy-shaped bottle, grossed $33 million at mass-merchandise outlets excluding Wal-Mart, according to Symphony IRI, a Chicago-based market research company. Meanwhile Brut, which was introduced in 1964 and endorsed by Joe Namath during his heyday, grossed $9 million. “Brut is an amazing fougère,” said Mr. Roschi, referring to the lavender-based fragrance family also including Canoe (introduced in 1936 and still in production).
But for a generation raised on CK Be and body sprays like Axe, retro scents aren’t necessarily an easy sell. At Beverly Hills Perfumery, which stocks a comprehensive collection of vintage perfumes, the owner, Alan Berdjis, sprayed a test card with Pour Monsieur and took a long sniff. “It’s kind of a thin, creamy citrus,” he said approvingly. But Mr. Berdjis, 30, added, “If you introduced this today and it did not have the Chanel brand recognition, I don’t think it would do well.” Why? “You smell it and just know: this is an old fragrance.”
Epitomizing the new is Acqua di Gio, introduced by Giorgio Armani in 1996 and the No. 1-selling fine men’s fragrance for the past 10 years, according to the NDP Group. Acqua di Gio popularized the light, quiescent “aquatic” accord that dominates men’s fragrances today and has inspired countless imitators — “a slew of apologetic, bloodless, gray, whippetlike, shivering little things that are probably impossible, and certainly pointless, to tell apart,” Mr. Turin said.
Compared to the breezy aquatics, certainly, the classic ’60s scents — with their base notes of musk, oak moss, sandalwood and leather — can seem leaden, especially to younger noses. Nevertheless, sweet, unisex aquatics are ceding market share to scents redolent of woods and spices. Of the top four men’s fragrances introduced in 2010, “two were woods, one was a woody oriental and only one was a water,” said Karen Grant, a beauty industry analyst with the NDP Group.
The introduction last year of Bleu de Chanel, which despite its sport-aquatic-sounding name is considered a woody aromatic, was a sign that the pendulum is swinging toward earthier accords; it became the No. 3 best-selling men’s scent in the United States.
Men are far more brand-loyal than women when it comes to fragrance, Ms. Grant said, “which is why when something becomes a top scent it continues to be a top scent — it’s hard to break into that ranking.” She added that in survey after survey, men say the No. 1 consideration when they buy a fragrance is that it appeal to their partners.
“A lot of women feel the newer fragrances for men are a little too feminine,” Mr. Berdjis said, a sentiment hammered home in the recent “The Old Spice Guy” campaign, which pointedly mocked “lady-scented body washes” with the tag, “smell like a man, man.” Female customers at his store, Mr. Berdjis added, “buy the older-type fragrances to give to their boyfriends.”
“Their preference on a man goes back to the more masculine type of smell,” he continued. “That might speak to how society has changed — you didn’t have metrosexuals in the 1960s.”
Indeed, what constitutes a masculine fragrance today, said Mr. Roschi, who himself wore Chanel No. 5 for several months, “is going to be much more diverse than it was in the ’50s and ’60s, because masculinity has evolved so much.”
