Dune by Christian Dior is one of the most expensive perfumes available. For a small 100ml bottle of eau de toilette, you can expect to pay in excess of £100. As it is a designer perfume, you can expect to pay a premium for the privilege.
There are a few reasons that designer perfume is more expensive than non-designer perfume. If you’re curious about what determines the price of a designer scent, read on.
What is Dune perfume?
Dune is one of the signature perfumes from the Christian Dior collection. It is a woody scent with base notes of amber, middle notes of lily and top notes of mandarin orange. It was first launched in 1991 by Jean-Louis Sieuzac, Nejla Barbir and Dominique Ropion. It’s a very summery scent, designed to evoke visions of warm sandy beaches and fresh ocean breezes.
Why is Dune so expensive?
Dune is expensive because it is a Dior perfume. Dior is famous for creating scents with only the best ingredients. For example, one of their ingredients is worth more than its weight in gold, which is why Dior fragrances come with a big price tag.
Dior grows all of their own jasmine and roses, and cultivates them in large fields in the south of France. Seven million jasmine flowers are needed to make one kilogram of absolute, which is an essential component in perfume making.
To make things more complex and expensive, these flowers can only be picked between 8am and midday, as this is when their scent is the strongest. This means that it takes 1,400 man hours to complete a harvest of the flowers.
And this is just one of the components in Dior perfume, so you can imagine the attention to detail that goes into each bottle. Dior is certainly doing something right, as they saw an increase in sales of perfumes and cosmetics grow by 17% in 2022, making it a record year.
Why are designer perfumes so expensive?
While a lot of work does go into the development of these scents, it’s the label that you are really paying for. Since many designer clothes are inaccessible to most people on a modest budget, fashion houses needed to find a way to access more people and grow their market share without cheapening their brand.
Fragrance and cosmetics is one way to achieve this. While you might not be able to afford a wardrobe full of Christian Dior clothing and accessories, you may be willing to splash out on a small bottle of luxury perfume.
Close attention is paid to the design of the bottle and the packaging to ensure that it feels as close to the brand as possible. This allows normal people to enjoy a luxury treat that feels indulgent, and fashion houses can bolster their profits by selling perfume at a high markup.
How can I get designer perfume cheaper?
If you love the scent but hate the price tag, there are a few ways you can save money on your fragrances. First, try shopping the sales to get a bargain on your favourite scents. This will require you to wait around for key shopping events like Black Friday.
If you can’t wait that long, try looking for dupes of your favourite scents. Once we know the scent components of a fragrance, it’s possible to replicate this very closely. This means you can enjoy the same scent at a fraction of the cost. While you won’t enjoy the same packaging and brand label, you’ll still get to enjoy the scents you love.