Premium fragrance sales continue downward trend
This holiday season companies pushing perfumes etc. are having a tough time according to this Wall Street Journal story (subscription required):
Fragrance sales in U.S. department stores this year are expected to slip by as much as 3%, to about $2.8 billion, following a similar decline in 2001, according to NPD Group, a market-information company. Sales of women's fragrances are expected to do even worse, falling a projected 5%. The holiday season still produces nearly 40% of department-store fragrance sales annually. But there's clearly something wrong with this premium-priced chunk of the business known as "prestige" fragrances. Perhaps they simply aren't prestigious anymore.
Few young women wear the same fragrance every day, as their mothers did. They wear it rarely, if at all, and when they do, they are increasingly more likely to favor the inexpensive fragrances available at specialty-store chains such as Victoria's Secret or Gap.