The case against "niche" and "designer"

Introduction

My obsession before fragrance was watches. I still love them but don't collect actively and I'm not part of the "community" as it were. But when I was, there was lots of discussion about "fashion" watches vs the "real" or "serious" watch brands. And the distinction between the two is much the same as in the fragrance community: "fashion" watches are made by brands where watches aren't their main focus; i.e. clothing designer brands or jewelry makers, rather than "serious" watches that are made by brands whose history is rooted in watchmaking.

The bias against fashion watches is much worse than the bias against designer fragrances however. They are hated to the point where someone gets actively made fun of if they post about Gucci watches for example, or even worse, a brand like MVMT that just resells very cheap watches straight from Alibaba, with their branding added, for 20x profit. Fashion watches are essentially not considered watches an enthusiast would even think about wearing. It's so bad that newbies will automatically discount Bvlgari watches as "fashion" and ignore them, whereas those in know are aware that they compete with the big dogs in terms of quality, despite being a fashion brand.

So when I first got into fragrances and saw the distinction being made between "designer" and "niche" brands, I thought I knew exactly where I stood. Of course, niche fragrances are higher quality, and enthusiasts wouldn't be caught dead wearing designers, right?

Boy was I wrong. The difference between "niche" and "designer" in the fragrance community is much more subtle; so subtle, in fact, that it becomes difficult to distinguish or ultimately matter, making the distinction, in my opinion, unnecessary:

Quality difference

One of the arguments that proponents of the niche/designer distinction have is that niche fragrances are higher quality. Having seen lots of GCMS breakdowns of both niche and designer fragrances, I can tell you they use a lot of the same materials, and niche brands aren't using much more naturals in their fragrances than designer brands. Houses like Guerlain can easily compete with niche brands in their quality, even among their cheaper offerings.

Not only that, but designer brands use many of the same perfumers as well. If anything, designer brands can hire better perfumers, and keep them on as house perfumers so the brand has a cohesive theme and creative vision, like Chanel and Dior, rather than niche houses who usually hire a different perfumer for each new release.

The only thing I can see going for this argument is that designer brands want to appeal to the majority whereas niche brands aren't as concerned with that. But designer private lines are not sold in department stores, and the perfumers can take a lot more risk and are given more creative freedom with those, so I don't think that argument quite holds up either. And assuming it did, there plenty of niche brands like Creed and PDM that want to appeal to the least-common-denominator as well, so it makes it a moot point.

What makes a brand "designer?"

Another difficulty is actually classifying brands as designer or niche. Usually the rule is "was the brand famous for making something else before adding perfume to their catalog?" or at least, that's how I've understood it. But then you come to a brand like Marc-Antoine Barrois, which started as a fashion brand. Are they niche or designer? I think the almost-universal consensus is niche. Heck, even Creed claims to have been a fashion boutique before they made fragrances, but god only knows what is true or false about the history of that brand.

Another example is Aesop. I'm pretty sure most people consider them a designer brand, but Le Labo for instance offers a similar suite of fragrance-adjacent products such as hair care, skincare, toiletries, etc. and yet they are considered niche. Why?

The words themselves

One of my biggest pet peeves is that "niche" and "designer" aren't antonyms in the slightest. A brand can be both or it can be neither. It's easy to find some that are neither, just any brand that isn't considered niche but is not a clothing or accessory brand; i.e. celebrities, car manufacturers, glassmakers (Lalique, Baccarat), cigar makers (Davidoff). But there are also brands that I would classify as both niche and designer; a brand that is a clothing designer but creates fragrances that are more unique/artisanal, and not found in most department stores. Some examples would be Loewe, Comme des Garcons, Maison Margiela, or Dries van Noten.

The definition of "niche" is "denoting products, services, or interests that appeal to a small, specialized section of the population." So the opposite of that is "mainstream," or "mass-appealing!" But niche brands like PDM and MFK make mainstream and mass-appealing scents all the time. Just like niche designer brands, you now have mass-appealing niche fragrances, which is an oxymoron.

Pedigree and heritage

In the watch world, one of the most important reasons the "real" watch brands are set apart from the "fashion" ones is their history and heritage. The big watch brands like Rolex, Patek Philippe, Zenith, Omega just to name a few, have written the history of the watch as we know it today. From design elements to achievements, they were the innovators, and that is why they are so respected.

But who wrote the history of fragrances? Designers! Chanel, Coty, Guerlain, Caron — these are the brands that created the first popular fragrances, that innovated perfumery. So how can we say now that these houses are subpar or in any way lesser than their niche counterparts?

Conclusion

I obviously know that I will have little to no effect on how people think about and discuss fragrances, and that this article is little more than a rant that no one will really take seriously. But I do want to offer an alternative to "niche" and "designer" in case there are like-minded folks who are as irritated with these labels as I am. My solution is twofold: 1. Use "mainstream" rather than "designer" and 2. Label individual fragrances rather than houses.

To me, a fragrance is "mainstream" if it is sold in your local "basic" department store (for me it is Macy's), or if it is very popular and widespread despite only being sold in boutiques or luxury stores, like Baccarat Rouge 540 Eau de Parfum or Aventus. Niche fragrances are those that a non-enthusiast would not have come across or know about.

Again using Baccarat Rouge 540 Eau de Parfum as an example of a mainstream fragrance, Maison Francis Kurkdjian also makes niche fragrances. Oud Extrait de Parfum sits right next to Baccarat on the shelf, but is largely ignored by non-enthusiasts. So MFK is not a "niche" house or a "mainstream" house, but a house that makes both niche and mainstream fragrances, as are most other houses. Dior makes both Sauvage Eau de Toilette, the mainstreamiest mainstream fragrance of all, but it also makes New Look and Oud Rosewood Eau de Parfum, fragrances that non-enthusiasts would think smell gross. Why restrict a huge catalog into one box only?

So, what does everyone else think? Are the terms "niche" and "designer" antiquated with the rise of designer private lines and mass-appealing niche-brand fragrances? Or is it still useful to make a distinction between houses that only make fragrance as opposed to those who sell other product lines?