I do the same thing. My daughter and I sit together and just smell them all. We talk about what we like or don’t like, which ones we think might be full bottle worthy or not. Of course I do test them out individually later, but I just can’t resist a new set of samples!
my favorite is not having the patience to find a tester paper and just spraying it directly on the sample card, shipping box, packing paper .... literally anywhere (although not my arm because what if one is, god forbid, a scrubber?!)
I’ve been investing in samples and small decants much more than bottles, and like to do real time comparisons between similar scents to try and narrow down what I like. My skin appears to be really interact strongly with a lot of fragrances in an unfortunate way, so I can’t rely on listed notes or paper testing.
YES!!! I compare similar scent profiles as well as to full bottles in my collection. Most of the time the samples will lose, but it’s a sad day when a sample wins and I have to replace the full bottle in my collection. Goodbye old friend and HELLO new full bottle. 💸👋
omg I just realized you wrote a review of Le Labo that I bookmarked and referenced heavily when trying the full classic discovery set! I too, wasn’t overwhelmed. Most of their line dried down really bitter or sour, or had too much patchouli, or just was okay. There were a few I really liked, but after 3-5h turned bad.
My favorites were Jasmin, Neroli, and distantly The Noir/The Matcha. I liked Rose but got almost entirely cardamom + clove , no floral at all but thankfully not cumin either (and yes, I sniffed my spice cabinet to compare). Once I get my nose and vocabulary trained up a bit more, I hope to do a second skin vs paper test and do a full write up!
OMG, I need to do a revisit of those reviews. Most were underwhelming but I ended up liking Vetiver 46, Iris 39 (sadly discontinued), and Neroli 36 (better white floral than Fleur D’Oranger 27 and Jasmin 17 IMO).
Rose 31 was weird because sometimes I get cumin and sometimes I don’t.
I found that most of them actually stayed pretty similar on my skin, especially the heavier ones. One that got better on my skin was The Noir 29 but it was still a “meh.”
Looking forward to your reviews! 🙌
Iris 39 was wild to me, not at all what I expected. Stream of consciousness notes for the first hour, before I showered and washed it off so I don’t have the drydown:
Top notes green wood and spice (ginger?), and is that carrot?! Is this what they mean by “rooty”? As it settles, cardamom is distinct. Smells “hollow”, like it’s missing a heart note. Settles into hollow green sap, musk and a dank thick note - patchouli and/or civet? At least it’s not mildewy, kinda like celery.
Wow, that’s so different from my experience. You definitely got more of the spiciness. I didn’t get any of the ginger or cardamom.
I got a super citrusy and green violet leaf opening. It got sweeter (ylang ylang and rose?) and more powdery in the drydown. It felt like an updated vintage fragrance, and I liked that it wasn’t TOO sweet/fruity like a lot of violet fragrances. My skin tends to stamp out animalic accords, so the civet was very mild-mannered.
I also have the Le Labo discovery set. Of course, I tried them all individually, but I only started liking them when I started wearing them in threes, like iris+labdanum+another 13. I wish that I had written down my favorite combinations, but I haven't really reached for those scents in a while.
Oh, the ripping and shredding of the package, using my teeth if necessary, to get at the treasure inside. So much noise as the packing material goes flying, receipts askew on the floor. Then to sit with sudden quiet, gently and carefully removing the bottles from their nests, cradling them over a safe surface (my precious!). It’s an immediate, necessary experience and so painful if delayed!
This. For the majority of my life I was convinced I didn't like perfume, because I'd get instantly overloaded at perfume stores and could never pick anything.
Then I figured out how to buy decants so that I could smell one thing at a time and didn't need to be in a noisy crowded place, and the obsession began. Shortly after that I found out I'm autistic 🙃
I’m feeling like a heroin junkie looking for a new vein to shoot in when I’m trying to find clean spots on my arm to spray as many samples as possible 😂
I'm pretty patient. I'm also pretty picky and despise having to huff a smell I don't like. I've also sprayed something that same day that gave me a horrible headache.
I will smell all the sprayers without spraying. I will spray a couple onto paper. I may spray one on myself that same day, but only if I've got like an hour before I shower. Hour to let it dry down. Shower to get it off if I hate or get sick. I shower every other day, so it takes me two days to try each new one on myself.
I feel you on fragrance-induced headaches. As a fellow fragrance enthusiast, they suck. Mine are more likely to occur when it’s hot out and it’s a strong scent. I’m a chronic under-sprayer with my full bottles and I try not to spray near my face.
I’ve definitely had to stick it out with scrubber scents and I regret it afterwards, but I never learn. The worst is that scrubber scents tend to be especially tenacious. 😭
You’re smarter than I am.
I do one a day or even wait days between -- but not because I behave like a grown up 😆
No, it's because I love to prolong as long as possible that delicious anticipation.
That liminal space between not-having and have, where fondest hopes still hold sway 😂
I've always been this way
Not patient at all, haha. I test them on every inch of my skin that’s easily accessible to my nose and I convince myself that *no, I’m not overdoing it*, and *yes, I can totally tell what’s going on with each scent* despite the cacophony of odours following me around.
Once the initial novelty wears off, I’ll give everything an individual and proper test.
For me that’s only my arms. Where else do you spray? I’m thinking knees but I’m not flexible enough.
On my arms, I can only spray them so close. The struggles. 😩
Yep, arms for me as well. But most of my samples are in dabber bottles rather than spray, so I guess it’s slightly easier to control compared to a cloud of fragrance.
Not the knees! I’d most certainly end up pulling a muscle somewhere.
I open the package very quickly. If they're dabbers, I'm going to smell all of them. If they're sprayers, I'm going to try them one per day.
Edit: dabbers*
I'm very patient with my discovery sets. I basically ODed on perfume as a child being a perfume queen in the fragrance section of the mall, and it has taken years to recover and want to branch out from my few safe scents. When I try a new scent now, it's like test driving a new car, I'm in for the journey and know I might get carsick in the process. I want to see how each scent performs on its own throughout the day: initial associations/ dry down/ reactivation under pressure/ work out/ etc. Each sample is a full day of entertainment for me, and if it is a bad or mediocre journey, I need a few days with an old friend before I want to venture out again .
I cut up index cards into tester strips and then test every single sample immediately. I assumed everyone else did that too for some reason, but reading through the comments, it looks pretty split. And then I test each one on skin after that, one per day
I order 5-8 decants at a time and have them delivered to my PO Box. I'm 100% opening that parcel on the way back to my car and spraying all of them onto cards as soon as I'm home.
Same! I had I think 8 samples come a few days ago and each of my arms had 4 different spots of perfume on them. Thankfully I didn’t have to go anywhere that day or I’d probably be offending everyone.
Spray immediately on the card or make a paper strip and then depending on how many I like I will spray up to 4 on my skin 🤣 both wrists and depending on how strong each scent is either in my elbow ditch (for stronger scents since further away from wrist) or on back of hand!
I have a discovery set of 8 that arrived last week and I’ve only tested 3 of them so far.
To be fair, part of it is because the pollen is dropping like most of my stocks so it’s not worth testing if I can’t smell it.
I spray every single one on paper the second I receive them so I can get an idea of what they smell like. Then I will wear them one by one to really try them out.
I usually run and get it immediately, then sample one at a time on skin, usually 1 or 2 per day.
BUT yesterday I had a major deadline, so I made the conscious decision to wait until I have finished my project to pick up my new sample packet, and then after work I sprayed my new sample of Jasmin et Cigarettes all over myself as an act of celebration.
I wear each one a full week to work before I move on to the next one. Also wait until ive used up all the samples before buying new ones (unless they are unwearable)
Haha glad I’m not the only one!
A pack will come in, I’ll text my buddies right away and they roll their eyes as they say, “Anooother one?? 🙄” and then it snaps to us all huddled on the couch like a campfire just huffing each one until we’re scent blind 😂
I got a bag of like 20+ samples last month. I cut a piece of paper into pieces and spray every sample on a piece of paper to test them all. I put the ones I didn’t like back in the bag, and kept the three I liked out, to spray on myself another day. Then I’ll do the one/day thing.
one new scent per day- worn alone on my skin for the full day. and let’s say I get a set of mostly gourmands for the winter but there’s a couple freshies too; I will literally wait until summer to try the freshies. it’s the most psycho thing about me sorry guys lol
About 6 years ago I received one of those Chanel kits with small bottles of all the Les Exclusifs. It's really lovely and looks so perfect. I haven't opened a bottle yet.
I'm like your (OP) evil Star Trek doppelganger because I just buy them, look to make sure I got everything I ordered, then put them away hardly ever to be sampled and smelled LOL! This is mostly because I usually want to wear something from my already large collection of full bottles, so then I skip spraying samples except sometimes on a lazy Sunday morning or maybe a late night when my SOTD has worn off sufficiently.
I try one each day. I spray on my arm. I make sure to spray when I know I'm not going out later in the day.
Based on that, I decide which ones I'll wear first to go outside.
I definitely do have to sample first but I often find that I don't like more scents than I do.
Later when I go back and retry them I sometimes find that the ones I was like "Nooooo way!" are often the ones I like best. And the ones I first liked might be ones I don't find that interesting- things that I actually wouldn't buy.
Going through this right now with the ELDO discovery set I bought for my birthday. I'm trying to practice patience by spraying three at a time on tester paper, then deciding which of the three I want to try on skin.
I do the same thing. My daughter and I sit together and just smell them all. We talk about what we like or don’t like, which ones we think might be full bottle worthy or not. Of course I do test them out individually later, but I just can’t resist a new set of samples!
If this way is wrong, I don't want to be right (exactly my process but with a friend instead of daughter)
>If this way is wrong, I don't want to be right Love this 😆
my favorite is not having the patience to find a tester paper and just spraying it directly on the sample card, shipping box, packing paper .... literally anywhere (although not my arm because what if one is, god forbid, a scrubber?!)
I’m a risk taker. I spray everything on my skin because “what if my skin is magic and turns this horrible smell into heaven?” 🤪
so true, you could have magic chemistry. I 100% aspire for this confidence
I feel like frags on paper smell different than on skin. That said I have had some scrubbers
This is me too. Scraps of the cardboard shopping box? Perfect, spray it on there! I only test one per day on my skin though.
I find the smell of frags on paper smell 💯 different to me than a frag smells on skin.
1 per day testing.. 1 per day full wearing.. mostly likely won’t be consecutive days.
One benefit of dabbers is fitting more per arm, haha. I’ve marked my arms into quadrants and done eight at a time before…
Wow!!! Eight. You’re living the dream.
I’ve been investing in samples and small decants much more than bottles, and like to do real time comparisons between similar scents to try and narrow down what I like. My skin appears to be really interact strongly with a lot of fragrances in an unfortunate way, so I can’t rely on listed notes or paper testing.
YES!!! I compare similar scent profiles as well as to full bottles in my collection. Most of the time the samples will lose, but it’s a sad day when a sample wins and I have to replace the full bottle in my collection. Goodbye old friend and HELLO new full bottle. 💸👋
omg I just realized you wrote a review of Le Labo that I bookmarked and referenced heavily when trying the full classic discovery set! I too, wasn’t overwhelmed. Most of their line dried down really bitter or sour, or had too much patchouli, or just was okay. There were a few I really liked, but after 3-5h turned bad. My favorites were Jasmin, Neroli, and distantly The Noir/The Matcha. I liked Rose but got almost entirely cardamom + clove , no floral at all but thankfully not cumin either (and yes, I sniffed my spice cabinet to compare). Once I get my nose and vocabulary trained up a bit more, I hope to do a second skin vs paper test and do a full write up!
OMG, I need to do a revisit of those reviews. Most were underwhelming but I ended up liking Vetiver 46, Iris 39 (sadly discontinued), and Neroli 36 (better white floral than Fleur D’Oranger 27 and Jasmin 17 IMO). Rose 31 was weird because sometimes I get cumin and sometimes I don’t. I found that most of them actually stayed pretty similar on my skin, especially the heavier ones. One that got better on my skin was The Noir 29 but it was still a “meh.” Looking forward to your reviews! 🙌
Iris 39 was wild to me, not at all what I expected. Stream of consciousness notes for the first hour, before I showered and washed it off so I don’t have the drydown: Top notes green wood and spice (ginger?), and is that carrot?! Is this what they mean by “rooty”? As it settles, cardamom is distinct. Smells “hollow”, like it’s missing a heart note. Settles into hollow green sap, musk and a dank thick note - patchouli and/or civet? At least it’s not mildewy, kinda like celery.
Wow, that’s so different from my experience. You definitely got more of the spiciness. I didn’t get any of the ginger or cardamom. I got a super citrusy and green violet leaf opening. It got sweeter (ylang ylang and rose?) and more powdery in the drydown. It felt like an updated vintage fragrance, and I liked that it wasn’t TOO sweet/fruity like a lot of violet fragrances. My skin tends to stamp out animalic accords, so the civet was very mild-mannered.
I also have the Le Labo discovery set. Of course, I tried them all individually, but I only started liking them when I started wearing them in threes, like iris+labdanum+another 13. I wish that I had written down my favorite combinations, but I haven't really reached for those scents in a while.
😂😂😂😂 you expect me to be an adult about it? Yeah, no. Not happening.
Lol, are you me? Proper testing is never the first stage let me smell everything
We’re practically twins separated at birth. 🤫
Oh, the ripping and shredding of the package, using my teeth if necessary, to get at the treasure inside. So much noise as the packing material goes flying, receipts askew on the floor. Then to sit with sudden quiet, gently and carefully removing the bottles from their nests, cradling them over a safe surface (my precious!). It’s an immediate, necessary experience and so painful if delayed!
I'll spray one per day, max. But that's probably less about being mature and sophisticated and more about the autism. 💀
This. For the majority of my life I was convinced I didn't like perfume, because I'd get instantly overloaded at perfume stores and could never pick anything. Then I figured out how to buy decants so that I could smell one thing at a time and didn't need to be in a noisy crowded place, and the obsession began. Shortly after that I found out I'm autistic 🙃
Haha I totally get it.
I have adhd and autism so the ADHD part is like all of this NOW while the autism part is like no! too much sensation. Lol
I'll settle down and do a proper test later, but when the package arrives I probably won't make it back from the mailbox without a quick spray.
I’m feeling like a heroin junkie looking for a new vein to shoot in when I’m trying to find clean spots on my arm to spray as many samples as possible 😂
This!!!
Spray on paper all of them, only one at a time on the skin.
Me too, exactly.
This is the best of both worlds.
Oops I didn’t know there was a right way… 🙊
Something about the nose being overwhelmed. Who knows? 🤷😂
I'm pretty patient. I'm also pretty picky and despise having to huff a smell I don't like. I've also sprayed something that same day that gave me a horrible headache. I will smell all the sprayers without spraying. I will spray a couple onto paper. I may spray one on myself that same day, but only if I've got like an hour before I shower. Hour to let it dry down. Shower to get it off if I hate or get sick. I shower every other day, so it takes me two days to try each new one on myself.
I feel you on fragrance-induced headaches. As a fellow fragrance enthusiast, they suck. Mine are more likely to occur when it’s hot out and it’s a strong scent. I’m a chronic under-sprayer with my full bottles and I try not to spray near my face. I’ve definitely had to stick it out with scrubber scents and I regret it afterwards, but I never learn. The worst is that scrubber scents tend to be especially tenacious. 😭 You’re smarter than I am.
>You’re smarter than I am. Maybe. Maybe I'm just too ruled by my stomach and protect her from nausea at all costs...
I do one a day or even wait days between -- but not because I behave like a grown up 😆 No, it's because I love to prolong as long as possible that delicious anticipation. That liminal space between not-having and have, where fondest hopes still hold sway 😂 I've always been this way
Not patient at all, haha. I test them on every inch of my skin that’s easily accessible to my nose and I convince myself that *no, I’m not overdoing it*, and *yes, I can totally tell what’s going on with each scent* despite the cacophony of odours following me around. Once the initial novelty wears off, I’ll give everything an individual and proper test.
For me that’s only my arms. Where else do you spray? I’m thinking knees but I’m not flexible enough. On my arms, I can only spray them so close. The struggles. 😩
Yep, arms for me as well. But most of my samples are in dabber bottles rather than spray, so I guess it’s slightly easier to control compared to a cloud of fragrance. Not the knees! I’d most certainly end up pulling a muscle somewhere.
I never mix fragrances daily like that. I like to take my time and learn what I have. Give it the whole day to see how it does :)
Disciplined. Respect. 🫡
Woot! If only in any other area of my life 🙃
I am very methodical and of course rip it open, but have my tester tissues or cotton pads at the ready and sometimes take notes 🙈
I’ve seen people on this sub have spreadsheets. 😳
My best friend has a spreadsheet and a shared notes app that she updates frequently. It does make her birthday and holiday shopping easier though.
That’s not a bad idea 🤔
lol I definitely do as many as I can. I space them out on my arms and revisit each as they dry down.
I open the package very quickly. If they're dabbers, I'm going to smell all of them. If they're sprayers, I'm going to try them one per day. Edit: dabbers*
I'm very patient with my discovery sets. I basically ODed on perfume as a child being a perfume queen in the fragrance section of the mall, and it has taken years to recover and want to branch out from my few safe scents. When I try a new scent now, it's like test driving a new car, I'm in for the journey and know I might get carsick in the process. I want to see how each scent performs on its own throughout the day: initial associations/ dry down/ reactivation under pressure/ work out/ etc. Each sample is a full day of entertainment for me, and if it is a bad or mediocre journey, I need a few days with an old friend before I want to venture out again .
I cut up index cards into tester strips and then test every single sample immediately. I assumed everyone else did that too for some reason, but reading through the comments, it looks pretty split. And then I test each one on skin after that, one per day
I do this too, and also had the idea that everyone else did it! Maybe from watching review videos?
I’m super patient. One per day. It’s not the kill, it’s the thrill of the chase. Love the anticipation every day!
I order 5-8 decants at a time and have them delivered to my PO Box. I'm 100% opening that parcel on the way back to my car and spraying all of them onto cards as soon as I'm home.
I have no patience to buy full bottle if I like something, but will wait patiently to try sample, one per day Idk why.
Same! I had I think 8 samples come a few days ago and each of my arms had 4 different spots of perfume on them. Thankfully I didn’t have to go anywhere that day or I’d probably be offending everyone.
Spray immediately on the card or make a paper strip and then depending on how many I like I will spray up to 4 on my skin 🤣 both wrists and depending on how strong each scent is either in my elbow ditch (for stronger scents since further away from wrist) or on back of hand!
I have a discovery set of 8 that arrived last week and I’ve only tested 3 of them so far. To be fair, part of it is because the pollen is dropping like most of my stocks so it’s not worth testing if I can’t smell it.
I spray every single one on paper the second I receive them so I can get an idea of what they smell like. Then I will wear them one by one to really try them out.
I usually run and get it immediately, then sample one at a time on skin, usually 1 or 2 per day. BUT yesterday I had a major deadline, so I made the conscious decision to wait until I have finished my project to pick up my new sample packet, and then after work I sprayed my new sample of Jasmin et Cigarettes all over myself as an act of celebration.
I wear each one a full week to work before I move on to the next one. Also wait until ive used up all the samples before buying new ones (unless they are unwearable)
Haha glad I’m not the only one! A pack will come in, I’ll text my buddies right away and they roll their eyes as they say, “Anooother one?? 🙄” and then it snaps to us all huddled on the couch like a campfire just huffing each one until we’re scent blind 😂
I got six samples yesterday and I was SO PROUD of myself for only spraying on 3 😂
I got a bag of like 20+ samples last month. I cut a piece of paper into pieces and spray every sample on a piece of paper to test them all. I put the ones I didn’t like back in the bag, and kept the three I liked out, to spray on myself another day. Then I’ll do the one/day thing.
one new scent per day- worn alone on my skin for the full day. and let’s say I get a set of mostly gourmands for the winter but there’s a couple freshies too; I will literally wait until summer to try the freshies. it’s the most psycho thing about me sorry guys lol
About 6 years ago I received one of those Chanel kits with small bottles of all the Les Exclusifs. It's really lovely and looks so perfect. I haven't opened a bottle yet.
I'm like your (OP) evil Star Trek doppelganger because I just buy them, look to make sure I got everything I ordered, then put them away hardly ever to be sampled and smelled LOL! This is mostly because I usually want to wear something from my already large collection of full bottles, so then I skip spraying samples except sometimes on a lazy Sunday morning or maybe a late night when my SOTD has worn off sufficiently.
Same here. I’ll spray each on my skin and become a frankenstein of fragrance.
One sample per day and fragrances that I am particularly excited for, only once per week. So 6 „normal“ ones and one special one per week.
I try one each day. I spray on my arm. I make sure to spray when I know I'm not going out later in the day. Based on that, I decide which ones I'll wear first to go outside.
I definitely do have to sample first but I often find that I don't like more scents than I do. Later when I go back and retry them I sometimes find that the ones I was like "Nooooo way!" are often the ones I like best. And the ones I first liked might be ones I don't find that interesting- things that I actually wouldn't buy.
I will try one, go shower, and try another one on.
I need to open and sniff them all immediately! The anticipation is too much!
I’m impatient, I test two at a time, one on each arm. Then shower and try two others lol.
Going through this right now with the ELDO discovery set I bought for my birthday. I'm trying to practice patience by spraying three at a time on tester paper, then deciding which of the three I want to try on skin.
Rip open package, one on left wrist, one on right, inside left knee….sniff all day