Understanding the Marketing Exceptionality of Prestige Perfumes

3Motivations for buying a prestige perfume

Prestige perfumes are not your average consumer product, as the previous discussion has suggested. Even though from the outside, perfumes may appear structurally as if they were a ‘packaged good’ sold and bought in distribution channels, the underlying dynamics differ from the simpler packaged goods.

The notions of ‘unique selling proposition’ or ‘attractive and differentiating product benefits’ justify the purchase of consumer goods by fulfilling a consumer need. There is no simple consumer need that one could attach to a prestige perfume. We don’t buy a prestige perfume because it adds whiteness or cleans deep-down dirt, even at a low temperature. It is, perhaps, the other way around. The honest answer ...