PHLUR. The scent of perfume can go a long way. It triggers the memory and is meaningful. Eric Korman is changing the fragrance market with PHLUR by making it easier to purchase your perfume without having to go to a department store. PHLUR is a fragrance company based in Austin that makes unisex perfumes, uses premium ingredients and environmentally responsible practices. Their fragrances are only sold online and their opaque, trendy bottles are 100% recyclable.
PHLUR is a play on words and fleur is French for flower. Korman explains, “When most people think of perfume in the traditional sense they think of the French and flowers. So we were playing on a twist of words if you will. Even though the French like to think they started perfume it was actually ancient Egyptians and we kind of like to poke a little fun at the same time. Also, the PH is a bit intentional because of the PH balance of your skin is actually one of the determining factors in how fragrance will smell on you versus a strip of paper.”
Prior to starting PHLUR, Eric Korman had been running global e-commerce for Ralph Lauren. His curiosity led him to the fragrance department one morning at Barney’s on Madison Avenue. “It’s really an area unlike most department stores in that they have hundreds of what would be called niche products. As I smelled these products I was really kind of amazed that they didn’t smell at all like my preconceived notion of the worlds perfume and cologne. There were all different scents evoking different feelings and emotions. That was an awaking for me. Yet, the room was filled with fragrance and there was just so much scent in there it was hard to smell any individual item. Then the purchase decision was based upon, ‘now we’re going to spray it on a blotter, hand it to you and you have 45 seconds to a minute to decide whether you want to buy this product.’ That didn’t seem like a genuine, organic type of buying decision.”
Korman decided to start PHLUR with his own values and values that his employees shared as well. “I think one of the things that we hold dear to us is everything we do should be optimized to be good for you and ultimately good for the environment. When we developed our product line, we were very specific with our partners that there could be no skin irritants, parabens, stabilizers or preservatives of any kind. We don’t want you spraying something on your body that’s not known to be safe for you. We’re wearing it too and one day my daughter and son will wear it.”
PHLUR’s appearance is different from most fragrances because their bottles are not clear. Korman explains, “All the packages you see in the department store today are typically 100% virgin glass. They’re virgin glass because they need to be clear, so you can see through them and the colored liquid inside; because the brands are trying to use the bottles to catch your eye in the department store setting. Well, we do not sell through a department store, so we’re not concerned about that objective. Instead, we are concerned about product integrity, which demands that the bottle should not be clear. Why? Because light damages fragrance; it’s just a fact. We want to protect the fragrance and don’t want it to go bad on your shelf at home. So we put PHLUR into opaque bottles. In addition, we use 20% post consumer recycled glass, which is the highest in the industry. [Furthermore], we also painted and decorated the bottles with vegetable base paint. So ultimately, that bottle can then be recycled by the consumer at the end of its life.”
Hanami, Olmsted and Vaux, Moab, Greylocke, Hepcat, and Siano are the current fragrances available from PHLUR. Each fragrance has it’s own mood, moment or feeling. Since you’re not able to smell the fragrance online, PHLUR has provided visuals on their site and one can listen to music on Spotify so you can see what inspired each scent. Korman adds that they’ll soon be releasing videos to have another component to help guide you to your fragrance choice.
As if PHLUR isn’t already interesting enough, all of their fragrances are unisex. “I came to realize that fragrance and perfume wasn’t always so gender specific. Fragrance started really gender neutral and you know, if you go back to Belle Epoque France, just as many men were wearing florals as women. That was intriguing to me. As I started thinking about the kinds of fragrances we wanted to create, it was obvious that our fragrances should be gender neutral. Ultimately, I think today’s modern consumer doesn’t think about gender norms the same way we did during the Mad Men era. I can create a really amazing floral that I could give to men, who if I didn’t tell them it was a floral, they would be like, ‘wow, that’s amazing!’ We intentionally didn’t want to play into those stereotypes, and at the same time we wanted to insure that the product was also consistent with our brand message. I think what’s amazing about fragrance is it’s very transportive. It makes you feel different things because there’s a physiological impact when you smell something – which is completely unique to scent.”
With each purchase of a PHLUR fragrance you are contributing to various non-profits across the globe. “Our full bottles retail for $85 dollars. When purchased, we take $5 dollars of the $85, and put it towards one of two different non-profit organizations; which as a percentage of price, is incredibly high in comparison to most other brands. Which organization receives the donation is based upon the scent purchased. For Olmsted and Vaux, which was inspired by Central Park, we give $5 dollars back to the Central Park Conservancy, which helps protect the park for generations to come. For all of the other scents, we give back to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature which helps protect endangered animals and plants.”
PHLUR has some “interesting things” from a sites perspective coming out in the fall and they’ve already started to work on additional fragrances. They’re also starting to brainstorm other products that are related to fragrance. To learn more about PHLUR, visit www.phlur.com, and you can follow them on Instagram at @phlur.
