Tis the season of brand deals, and the lads are selling hard. Clayton picking favs from Canoe Club and Oren realizes he’s the worst actor out of himself, Ashwinn and Jordan Rogers to promote you can get 3 months free of Air’s digital asset management for creatives if you do a demo before Christmas.

In today’s HYPER, we dive into the world of fragrance packaging and sales psychology, discuss photo licensing tech, and a collection of gift guides from some creators we love.

Let’s begin.

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The HYPER Fragrance Category Deep Dive

One of the (many) microcosms of TikTok on the culture is wild uptick in consumption and general appreciation of fragrances. In my friends with teen boys, one of the topics that comes up frequently is how they’re building “fragrance shelves”, and inevitably I’ll open up Perfume Tok and explain how its different from when we all pulled out Aqua Di Gio or Abercrombie Fierce back in our nostalgic heyday.

I’ve always loved this category because the packaging is SO important and over the top. In such a high margin category, but one where you have to experience it in order to make an informed product purchase, the packaging and recommendation are two huge levers that lead to a lot of brand creativity.

I bet you did not expect a consumer fragrance breakdown in this week’s HYPER, but here we are.

Standout packaging

Shalini the cap masters.

Reflections Copenhagen. A favorite here.

Tiziana Terenzi’s starfish.

And one of my personal favorites House of Oud

Samplers

One of our other favorite commerce callouts in the category is the sample pack. A major moneymaker for brands, and solves a crucial step in the customer experience - a customer can sample, and they’ll pay for it. I break these down in video here.

A few standouts:

My personal favorite from Dries Van Noten.

Byredo breakouts by category.

A quick note on the two above. Both are creditable towards the cost of a full scent from the brands. This is a big leg up compared to the (overpriced in my opinion) Le Labo sets, that charge $100+ and then you buy a full priced scent. They offer a discounted add-on option - but the consumer psychology of knowing you like one if you buy another is a great tool to justify the price of a scent set. Something worth considering if your business does sampling of any kind!

Margiela Replica, an absolute steal at Sephora (a great entrance point for customers to a brand they’ve heard of but likely dont understand).

Malin & Goetz steals the show with this $26 option.

And a proper splurge option from Diptyque

Brand extensions

Fragrance can be the purpose of a brand in its entirely, but its also an excellent brand extension, building a brand’s universe into different senses, defining it in every way a consumer can interact with it, is an interesting challenge brands firm in their identity love to tackle. Some of my favorites below.

Loveshack Fancy, extremely on brand (and a great brand to introduce fragrance with)
https://www.sephora.com/product/forever-in-love-eau-de-parfum-P507909

Marc Jacobs Daisy with the fun stem and flower cap application
https://www.sephora.com/product/marc-jacobs-fragrances-daisy-wild-eau-de-parfum-P509807

Cult Gaia a great example of staying on brand with presentation.
https://cultgaia.com/products/mast-eau-de-parfum

Sisley Paris is an interesting for how far of a departure the fragrance look is from the

Christian Louboutin with a natural visual brand extension.

Speaking of fragrance as brand extension…

Gifts of Sorts

I tweeted earlier this week that creators and brands should be doing short form video gift guides, and this stands true… my pro tip… go as niche and strange as you can.

Some of our friends and favs are all dropping gift guides, here’s a few we love!

@maggiesellers_

hot smart rich era loading #christmas #christmaslist #bfcm #christmasshopping #hotsmartrich #shopmy #greenscreen

Hyper Reports

Check out our market reports. We spend many hours researching markets, categories, and brands & products within the consumer space so you don’t have to.

• The Guide to Making Great merchandise — HERE — a guide to finding and producing your own merch

• Reports on Running, Golf, and Tennis — HERE — a guide to each sport, the market opportunities, and how to launch your own brand

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