Science seeks to visualise sweet scent of success

Think of a fine perfume and the chances are that luxurious names such as Chanel, Guerlain and Dior will spring to mind, with …

Think of a fine perfume and the chances are that luxurious names such as Chanel, Guerlain and Dior will spring to mind, with images of exotic and glamorous women.

From the fragrant madeleine, which acted as the catalyst for Proust's rambling recollections of times past, to Marilyn Monroe's famous remark that she slept in nothing but Chanel No 5, smell has the ability to bring alive memories and images more intensely than other senses.

The mystique is heightened by the knowledge that the finest perfume houses grow their own vast fields of roses and jasmine to ensure that only the purest scents make it into those expensive bottles.

But, while the most exclusive fragrances are the concoction of an elite of global perfumers, most scents owe more to science and computers than to decades of nasal training.

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In Britain, sales of male fragrances have been falling but nowhere near as rapidly as women's. The total European fine fragrance market rose in 1998 by 8.5 per cent, while US manufacturers managed to increase sales by only 4.4 per cent to $3.6 billion (€3.34 billion).

It is estimated that 150 perfumes are launched each year - only a handful of which will manage to notch up the £50 million sterling or so of sales which the top perfumers believe are necessary for success.

Encouraged by such proliferation, consumers are indulging themselves and demonstrating the butterfly buying evident in other markets. There is simply too much choice, a scent to go with every mood. Women no longer tend to stick to one perfume for life.

But, while fine perfumes may be going through temporary difficulties, there is no decline in the global appetite for evocative scents to go with every aspect of life. Scented candles and exotic bath oils, perhaps because of the rise in popularity of aromatherapy, are assuming some of the cachet which used to be associated with expensive perfumes.

"We translate ideas and concepts into smells," says Martin Holme, fragrance marketing manager at Quest, the ICI subsidiary which manufactures fragrances and flavours for food, household and perfume companies worldwide.

The company's own promotional brochures are full of sentiments such as "Quest perfumers are the dream-makers", "We harness the forces of creativity and control" - which would, in other sectors, be regarded as suspect.

But while Quest may be an operation which counts trends and moods as essential raw ingredients, it is a business increasingly grounded in science and new technology.

The briefest of introductions to the group's award-winning Miriad software programme is to have a powerful glimpse of what can be achieved when the imagination and skills are combined with one of the largest global consumer surveys and offered in a simple tick-the-box form to customers looking to scent anything from toilet cleaner to aftershave.

Although Mr Holme says there is a surprisingly large common response to smells across nationalities and around the world, there are also some distinct differences.

Many thousands of people have been interviewed to provide the basis of Quest's computer programme which can, for example, help manufacturers conjure up a smell which will be seen as fresh and sexy to consumers in Germany. The Quest team has even linked images to the fragrances which can dovetail with advertising and other promotional images.

The programme is used as a guide to help Quest's perfumers get as close as possible to what their customers want.

"The problem is that it's difficult to communicate, to talk about smells in a way which will mean anything to most people," he explained.

Experts can communicate in a variety of jargon and can even create new smells from memory if their noses are out of order, due to a cold, for instance. Most people, though, are locked into a very low level of smell talk, rather as many are with music. We like it or we don't.

In an attempt to get round this inadequacy, Quest has developed an add-on to its computer programme which it calls Lignes de Force - a title which, suiting the subject, means absolutely nothing in any language other than French. What Lignes de Force does, however, is to make visual the scent patterns of individual fragrances.

It measures the first to the last of the waves of odour given off and creates a trace. In that way lifelong lovers of Chanel No 5 can discover that their expensive perfume is only fractionally different from the much cheaper L'Aimant by Coty. The trace is so close that there is an industry joke that Coty produced the first recipe for No 5.

Combined with the company's ability to measure and recreate the "head space" of any smell in the world - Mojave desert flowers which bloom only once every three years have recently been mimicked - this is becoming an increasingly powerful tool.

Mr Holme says Quest, which is now considering collaborations with top chefs, will always be involved in the fine fragrance end of the business. He is determined it should continue to innovate: "you don't create new classics by standing still". He adds: "We rule out almost nothing: chocolate, cedar wood, candyfloss were all regarded as outlandish but have become mainstream."

For most people, though, the latest scents emerging from the most fashionable designers may prove a challenge too far: the star smells of the New York scent scene include "pruning shears", "dirt" and "funeral home".