You know….when running a business, trying to cook, or being creative: There are traps, pitfalls, deceptions, and usually it is us deceiving us.

When painting, there is this trap that a new color/paper/a new motif or new technique will change the name of the game. But the truth usually is: Just because you got this nice shiny new red, your rose won’t get better. Yesterday, in my painting class, we were doing flowers in watercolor. Using wet in wet. This is soooo difficult. Today’s picture gives you an idea. The difficulties are on various levels; the paper, the proper wetness, the color, the brush, the motif. You name it. How to master it? By doing it again, and again and again.

In perfumery, there is a similar trap. Sometimes, when formulas do not work, when envisioned effects aren’t there, when a scent does not last or falls apart, you search for the easy way out. New molecules (or new naturals). The magic ingredient that will solve all the troubles that you face. Wrong! New ingredients that you did not use before (as perfumer) won’t help, but rather add another level of complexity. You don’t know how they’ll behave. What’s the solution? Do it again and again and again. Although, sometimes, a new ingredient can do the trick (after having done it again and again), like

The longer the more I am convinced that actually, using a palette of ingredients that is limited but of high quality and diversity, that you know by heart and nose, might be the best you can do. I think it was Jean-Claude Ellena who mentioned once that there is no need for dozens of salicylates, for instance, but that two three different salicylates (molecules that render perfumes BIG and powdery and classy) are enough, that you /he can create whatever he wants to create with these few. I could not agree more.

When it comes to running a business, selling things, there are comparable traps. Adding more products, more and more, or discounts,  more and more, just to stay up there and out there. Especially the discounting , me thinks, is a dangerous path to follow. Do it once and you’ll do it forever. More’s not always better, like: More newsletters won’t get read better and more facebook posts won’t get more readers, except you pay for exposure in facebook. But even there, more exposure and impressions won’t do the trick. A sidenote: Facebook is very, very selective about who is going to see your posts and updates. If you run a company and want to go beyond facebook’s few hundred views: You have to pay for it. $$. Just to make sure that a page update is seen by your friends or people who liked your page or others. It is quite interesting to think about it: What we see in facebook, and I am not talking about paid ads, but about page updates and posts on business pages,  is not really entirely based on relevance and our interests and our preferences, but based on how much an entity running a facebook page is willing to pay.

So… maybe adding more money into my facebook ad accoun (that runs on zero right now) might indeed do the trick, who knows? I do not pay for page impressions, getting the tauer perfumes facebook page out there more promiently , yet, but might one fine day test it.  We’ll see.

For the time being, I continue working on my rose watercolors (urghh) and my various perfume trials.