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The news of today: The l’air du désert marocain is winner of the “gold award” on the 2009 basenotes awards for the “best niche, independent, artisanal or boutique fragrance“.

I want you to be a winner, too.

On Thursday, I go for a cycling holiday. When back in two weeks or so I will pick three winners of a bottle of air du désert marocain, shipped to any place in this world. Please leave a comment here on this post if you want to enter this draw.
(all winners are picked by random.org, and will get a mail from me in about 2.5 weeks.)

Let’s celebrate. Cheers to you!

today is a happy day. Finally, I can announce a new collaboration, in the UK. Scent and sensibility will be my partner in the UK, selling my fragrances online, starting end of July.
I invite all my UK perfume lovers and all interested to visit the scent and sensibility website: Now it is a blog. In about two weeks it will be a shop, featuring niche and more….Please say hello here.

Ronny, the lady behind the shop, and me discussed for weeks: About shop philosophies, about products and I wanted to learn more about the person behind the shop. Thus, I made a little interview with Ronny. Enjoy!
….
Andy: Dear Ronny, it is a pleasure sitting next to you in digital space. I wonder: When did you come up with this idea of getting a shop that sells fragrances? And I wonder why now?
Ronny: Hello Andy,
It’s a pleasure for me as well to have this cyber conversation.
You ask what the basis was for Scent-and-Sensibility Perfume and why now.
I’ve been a perfume lover, a perfumista, for as long as I can remember, back to my childhood.
I was working as an editor in the research department of a merchant bank, a job I’d done for 20 years. A loose idea of an online UK-based niche perfume store had formed itself in my head. I had no immediate expectation of doing much about it, though.
In my head, I ’saw’ a shop that stocked more obscure perfumes, that filled a gap in the UK market, if you will. From my own experience, I was aware that it isn’t  easy to get hold of samples in the UK. So, offering a comprehensive sample service that didn’t take second place to the sale of bottles was a big part of the picture. But as I said, it was in my head with no immediate likelihood of taking on a more concrete form. I have a child: I needed to be realistic; I needed to support us.
Then the banking crisis came along and with it redundancies. A few weeks before Christmas 2008 I got ‘the call’. Initially, I was disoriented and unsure about what to do next: should I try to get another City job? But the picture of the online shop pushed its way to the front of my consciousness: when would I be in a better position to try something new?
I also knew that the corporate life was eating away at me, had become soul-destroying. I wanted a life that felt integrated rather than being made up of disparate parts. I felt this was my opportunity to try to make work, parenthood and life in general work together in a more seamless way.
With some prescience, I had bought a domain name several months earlier. So, scent-and-sensibility.co.uk came to life – initially as a blog. Now the retail site is set to go live on 30 July. I’m starting from a small base of houses, but hope to expand my stock fairly quickly as the site becomes better known.
….
Andy: As we have talked a little bit about this topic before: I am sure you provide will a special shopping experience for perfumes in the UK and beyond.  Maybe you can tell me a little bit more ?
Ronny: As I mentioned above, I am a long-time perfumista.
I’ve turned myself into a pretzel in the past to get hold of a desired fragrance. I’ve been deeply frustrated by having to buy samples from outside the UK in order to try something before committing to a purchase. I’ve gnashed my teeth at ridiculous shipping costs. I’ve shaken my head at sample vials arriving loose in a jiffy envelope. Why couldn’t those of us in the UK have an easily accessible (ie, online) shopping destination that 1) offered more obscure fragrances; 2) made buying samples simple; 3) and valued the customers who made the site their destination?
As a consumer, I want and expect to have my custom valued. I want to be treated with consideration. I want attentive and courteous service. I want things nicely wrapped. And because I assume that’s what other consumers want that’s how I plan to run my business: with consideration, courtesy and respect.
….
Andy: Now that you start this venture: What is your biggest joy right now?
Ronny: There are so many things that are causing me pleasure at the moment. Friends and acquaintances have commented that I seem so much happier. I am really enjoying myself. I derive pleasure from almost everything associated with building up the business, from writing the blog entries, to approaching perfumers, to researching business structures and packing materials. Scent-and-Sensibility Perfume really is a labour of love. It’s a huge but fascinating learning curve. I also feel I have more input into the structure (I’m not ready to say ‘control’) of my day to day life now, and that feels great.
Picture: Ronny, from Scent and Sensibility.
Andy: For clients coming by, visiting your website, that are maybe new to the world of niche and the exclusive: Any hints where and how to start?
Ronny: One of my gripes as a consumer is that websites can sometimes be difficult to navigate. Some are just not built in an intuitive way. I worked very closely with Graham Phenix, the wonderful man who built my site, www.scent-and-sensibility.co.uk. We talked a great deal about what worked and what didn’t on websites and I hope and believe we came up with a very easy-to-navigate, intuitive buying experience.
For those who are new to niche fragrances, I would say wander around the site, explore before setting to the serious work of finding things you are interested in. The site is set up so you can browse by perfume house or by fragrance family. I used brief descriptions for fragrance families (eg, light floral, heady floral, incense) rather than symbols. I think it’s easier to navigate.
Also, the menu for the sample sets is front and centre: I definitely believe in being able to buy small amounts of fragrances before making the larger financial commitment to a bottle or bottles.
So, the site is all about encouraging exploration and indulging that most vital sense, smell.

….
Andy: Talking “exploration”…when I visit you in London one day: Will you buy me a beer?
Ronny: I will definitely buy you a beer – and fish and chips if you are so inclined. But first, I think we should go sniffing together. I bet that would be a wonderful experience.

Yesterday, I spent 3 (yes three) hours together with the most charming marketing, branding, graphic design guy you can imagine.

The goal: Discussing my brand, where I am and what might be missing to conquer the world. With 8 perfumes, names, flyers, boxes and bottles all on one big pile, you suddenly realize where there are missing items, and how things fit together.

Or not.

Thus, we agreed that there is work to get done. We will get into full gears later this year, when I have more time, after October. The goal: Get my brand ready for the next step. And make sure that the stones are in place allowing me to build this house for the next 5, 10 years. Right now, to be honest, the fundamentals are there, but things it won’t hold the next 5 years without adjustments. The challenge will be to keep what works and to move the brand carefully on slippery ground-
We came accross a few top issues. Like:

- Where is Tauer in Tauer Perfumes? As a matter of fact, he is hard to find on the products.

- Where is the fact that all products are truly unique, hand made, created by a perfumer that believes in traditional perfumery craftsmanship?

- And where do I want to be in 5 years from now, serving which clients, with what kind of products?
Mr. Branding brought it all down to the question: What’s you ideal client?- A New Yorker with two poodles?  And I go like: Yes! I love poodles!

More on poodles and branding later this year.

Picture:
My mom’s poodle, living now with my brother’s family.

I just ordered another 5 kg of the super trooper incense CO2 extract that goes into the two incenses scents. Boswellia serrata, CO2 extracted, is a dream for a perfumer to work with. Rich, woody, very incense, but without much of the windex quality, this harsh terpenes scent that often goes with incense extracts. Everytime, when mixing another incense extrême or incense rosé batch, like last Saturday, when pouring this golden liquid into the drum, I feel that there are dozends more perfumes hidden in this liquid, that just wait to be released.

But first, I wait for the vanilla CO2 that I ordered from the same company this morning. And even before I put my hands on any new fragrances, I need to cope with what I have.
In 90 minutes I will meet folks and start discussing what we have so far, in terms of products, flyers, web, you name it. That’s going to be a fun morning for sure.

And in 1 minute I will sneak off this computer to get another whiff of the gigantic lily bouquet in the living room. A gift from a neighbor. A white flower bomb. All natural.

Picture: a close up of the lily,
standing in my living room these days.

I am still very much in love with Vladimir’s comment of yesterday and the term he came up with: kitchen perfumer.

i wonder: How many kitchen perfumer are there? For sure there are less kitchen perfumer than niche perfumers. In order to be fair: The difference between a “kitchen perfumer” and a “little factory perfumer” is not that big. In some time I will have to get a little dedicated “factory” myself, too. A room or two more, a lab somewhere. What I do there would be the same what I do here and now, maybe on a different scale.

Nevertheless:The idea of someone mixing and pouring somewhere but not in a factory is intriguing.

Thus, the term is great.

Kitchen perfumers.

I’ll bet: One could build an entire brand around it.
Now, the kitchen perfumer will meet some marketing and branding and communication guys on Thursday. A positive side effect of the Sunday newspaper: Interesting contacts. The goal: Clean up the kitchen.

Every morning, when taking the train to Berne, the “Train à Grand Vitesse” stands on the track next to it . TGV to Paris. Usually, I do not take care much about it. If I do then I take it as a sign that I’ve seen Berne for a while. I guess you can’t compete with Paris, can you? Well, we will see what we say about the region of Beaune in two weeks: Cycling France again for about two weeks. In order to leave grey, wet and somewhat unsummerly Zurich without worries about perfume lovers having to wait too long for their perfumes from my little shop:

Making stock, bottling and pouring, and more stock….the weekend saw me making another batch of desert air and another one of extreme incense. going to be 25 liters each. Hereby, the weighing and pouring is just one part. The other job is: Documenting what we are doing, including writing down all the lot numbers of all ingredients and filling them into an excel table, one for each lot,and then adjusting the excel table of all the bottles in stock, checking for items that need to be ordered. Some of the material I use is sticky, gluey, like honey in consistency. These resins need to be warmed up gently and poured into the vessel standing on the balance.

I usually mix the raw materials with the lowest volatility first; with the exception of the most expensive materials. Just in case I would make a mistake.

Mixing these resins and oils and powders is like immersing in scents. Fluffy Ambroxan powder makes you feel like in a gigantic washing powder factory, although you won’t find Ambroxan in washing powder, with its 1000 $ US a kilo it is too expensive, and ambrein, a cistus ladaniferus extract is a perfume of its own. One day, when I have made enough stock and discussed enough leaflets and marketing I want to work with ambrein again. There is so much to discover in this natural treasure.

More on collaborations, and communications in the coming days. Stay tuned…

I am hitting the road in a minute to get my hair cut from an apprentice, who needs a guy to train his skills and prepare for his exams. Well… can’t be too bad, as he has exams in about 2 months. I am expecting an hour relaxation. Uff.

And I can tell you : I need this hour. Yesterday, I made 65 little teaser packs with teasers of the air du désert marocain, the rêverie au jardin and the rose chyprée. I prepared these for a workshop taking place in August in the US, that I feel very happy to support. I glued the sample vials on the cards (sorry Jen!) to make sure that they survive the handling and the transport. The little boxes are foldable business card boxes, simple, but effective to hold give-away teasers. I think I will make more of these for other occasions. Maybe with an extra ribbon or a dedicated sticker.
Then, we did tons of other samples, piles of air du désert, and mountains of sample discovery sets to cope with the last wave of orders from the Sunday newspaper. Funny… it doesn’t sound like a lot of work when writing about it.

And finally: Finishing the Italy leaflet, with Italian text and a slight modification on the picture. We are getting there….

I wish you now a lovely weekend. Relax and sniff!

Picture: The work bench
of yesterday showing the business card boxes holding the three teasers, there is one in the left lower corner with a hand made label sticked on top.

…with the leaflet for Italy that needs to be translated by dear Guido: I have corrected, optimized and integrated input from a variety of sides. Thank you! My special thanks goes to you, J. and D.  And a big, fragrant hug.

Thus, this is about as good as it gets these days.  Besides the leaflet, I have spent the morning with samples. And later today, I will finish them and then I’ll make 60 goodies ready. Goodies to support a workshop, somewhere up there in Pennsylvania. The last days were really samples dominated. And I can’t wait to fiddle with scents and paper strips again!

And here is the text:  going with the leaflet, inner part, right side. It got a touch longer and is at the limit of what I want to see there.

“Welcome to the fragrant world of Andy Tauer.

We invite you on an olfactory journey
to discover fragrances that are beyond the ordinary.

Andy Tauer’ s perfumes are inspired by unique places
and fragrant materials. They entice us to dream of the desert,
of verdant gardens, of dark roses, of cowboys.

He composes all perfumes himself and, all scents are bottled by hand
and carefully packed in Switzerland, for connoisseurs of craftmanship.
Andy Tauer’s modern creations breath the air of traditional perfumery
and are cleverly built on a high percentage of natural ingredients.

Try Andy Tauer’s perfumes and find out for yourself
why perfume lovers around the word have been seduced.”

picture: a detail from the inside of the leaflet.

as today is going to be a very busy day, featuring various highlights that are unfortunately all non perfumery related: Here a quick wrap -up of my Sunday jogging exchange with the W.-factor….talking about the economic crisis and the expectations folks have there, expecting miracles from public money. Feel free to translate this into: your money and China’s money, because the governments spend what they don’t have these days. Actually, they will never have. And now guess what: Who’s going to pay the bill? And on a second guess: How is it going to be paid. But now I am drifting….the jogging thoughts were more focused on freedom and prosperity.
Many take our freedom (of speech, human rights, etc.) as guarantee for economic prosperty. Often prosperity and freedom are used synonymously.

Prosperity and freedom come together quite often.

People think they are entitled to live a live in prosperity. There is nothing like the right for living a prosperous live.
And finally, we wondered how free our societies would remain if we would loose our (collective) prosperity.

I wish you a lovely day, enjoy your freedom.

The biggest wave is over, and we are all somewhat tired after yesterday. Wow. I had never so many orders in one day. It was a good test of stock and logistics: We somehow passed the test, but only with urgent deliveries and pick up yesterday night.

Somewhere in between, I managed to continue musing on the text that goes on page 3 of the leaflet (to be translated for  Italian perfume lovers). For those of my readers who missed the first, fun part in designing the leaflet: Here we go…..the link to a previous leaflet post.

In German you can say “gna gna gni - gna gna gna” to express something like “bla bla bla”. Hence, the title of this post. I find it hard to keep the balance between “Oh my, I am all excited about my fragrances and want to share this ” and “This is a cool offering for those interested.”.

Anyhow: the goal is to have the text finished by this week. I think we are getting there. Here we go:
“Welcome to the fragrant world of Andy Tauer.

We invite you to join his explorations and discover
fragrances that are beyond the ordinary.

Andy Tauer finds inspiration by places and fragrant materials.
His perfumes are unique and tell us stories: Of the desert,
of dreaming in a green garden, of dark roses, of cowboys.
He composes all perfumes himself and all scents are
hand made and carefully packed in Switzerland,
for the connoisseur of craftsmanship.

His creations breath the air of traditional perfumery.
A high percentage of naturals and the quality of the raw
materials makes them shine.

Try his creations and find out for yourself
why perfume lovers world wide fall in love.”