I had a couple emails from people who read my last post and became worried that I might change the current Champagne de Bois; I just added a phrase to that sentence in that post to make it read better (I hope!), but I thought I’d also post a quick note here to say I have no plans to change the current Champagne de Bois. What I had meant in that sentence is that I’d changed it last year as one of my goals. I’m very happy with how it is currently.
I should probably say a few words about my scent list strategy in general. The year 2007 was a major change for my offerings; I was closed for a number of months in 2007 while I worked on a new scent list and reorganized the website. During that downtime I discontinued a number of the more gourmand scents I’d had on my list and focused just on the special blends I did that were more unique. I’ve mentioned this change of direction several times on my blog. During 2008 I continued to develop the scent list in that direction, working on new scents and updating two of the older ones (Champagne de Bois and Ambre Noir).
I want to offer a shorter list than what I had pre-2007, but I want them all to be unique and very high quality. I don’t plan to do another large-scale adjustment of the list like I did in 2007, but it was a necessary thing to do at that time to move in the direction I wanted to go. I have a plan for what I want Sonoma Scent Studio to be, but it takes time to make it a reality because I’m doing it by myself. I’m happy with the progress so far, and I can’t say enough thanks for the encouragement and support I’ve received along the way.
I keep learning more and more each year I do this, and I acquire more beautiful materials to work with. I have added so many wonderful ingredients to my stock that it has opened up the possibilities to the scents I make. I do worry about the many fragrance launches already happening each year, and I always think about the ways I can make my offerings special as a small company free to use as expensive ingredients as I want without having per kilo price restrictions put on me or being told to use melon notes, lol. I’m lucky to have the freedom I do and hope to build a really fine but small collection of fragrances. Making the best products I can and providing excellent customer sevice have always been my primary goals, and I hope I can make a niche for myself that way.
PS I apologize to those who enjoy melon notes, but we all have a few things we don’t like and I rarely enjoy melon in fragrance even though I love fresh melon as food. I like almost every note in some contexts though, when done well (I need to sample FM Therese again because on first sampling years ago I thought it was very pretty but it does have a light melon note to many people, so there you go!).
