For today’s fragrance brands, feeling good is as important as smelling good

With its wellness-focused messaging, Heal the Way is perhaps Snif’s most on-trend launch. The brand is just one of many contemporary fragrance makers promising to help consumers not only smell good, but also feel good, reflecting changing norms on how we view mental health.  

Charlotte Tilbury expanded her namesake makeup brand to fragrance in April with the launch of six scents designed to trigger specific moods, using neuroscience-backed ingredients developed by fragrance manufacturer International Flavors & Fragrance. Bella Hadid’s Orebella fragrances launched this spring, too, and are built around “aura enhancing” essential oils, with Orebella also donating 1% of all net sales to charities like the Lower East Side Girls Club. Perfume newcomer Noyz, from Pattern by Tracee Ellis Ross incubator Beach House Group, debuted at Ulta last month and has donated to organizations like Campaign Against Living Miserably. (Noyz declined to disclose the dollar amount of the donation.) Last week, fitness guru Tracy Anderson debuted her first fragrance, which invites users to connect with their “higher self.”

“Mental health has become cool,” said Dr. Terri Bacow, licensed clinical psychologist and author of the book “Goodbye, Anxiety: A Guided Journal for Overcoming Worry.” “There used to be such stigma, and now, with younger generations and a shift in culture, it’s been much less stigmatized.”

And brands are looking for a piece of the cachet that comes with an increased acceptance and awareness of mental health: At Balenciaga’s fall 2024 couture show in Paris last week, creative director Demna sent models down the runway to the soundtrack of a meditation session. 

Fragrance is an especially apt product to convey mental health and wellness properties, in part because of our sense of smell’s direct connection to the limbic system, the part of the brain that controls emotion and memory. And that potential connection to wellness is particularly attractive to new, younger fragrance consumers who are looking for scents that challenge traditional marketing built around the likes of sex appeal. 

“The younger audience is engaging with fragrance in an entirely different way to an older audience,” said Lisa Payne, head of beauty at trend forecaster Stylus. Stylus’ research found that 71% of fragrance consumers are looking for a scent that lifts their mood, with male consumers in particular looking for “functional” fragrances.

Many of those fragrances experimenting with a mental health bent are priced under $150, making them apt for a younger audience, an especially valuable demographic. According to a 2023 report from beauty analysts at Circana, Gen Z’s fragrance usage climbed to 83% in 2023, and they are also the generation most likely to purchase themselves a fragrance multiple times a year. “They want newness, they want excitement, they want new ingredients, they want new combinations,” said Payne.

And though some companies take a broad approach, in terms of what wellness benefits their products actually deliver, Payne believes scientifically-backed claims will become more essential as the market becomes more saturated. “Anyone can create a fragrance and promise that it will make you sleepy or alive or whatever,” she said. “It’s very easy to promise these things. But the biggest, more important change to potentially [fuel] consumer demand is clinical testing.”

Brands, too, are experimenting with how fragrance can connect to other senses: After years working in sonic branding, Keelan Doyle launched functional fragrance line Others, which offers two scents promising to uplift or relax by leveraging decades of neuroscience research from fragrance manufacturer Givaudan. Each fragrance purchase also comes with six months of access to Others’ app, which provides tools like sonic therapy and breathwork intended to be paired with the fragrances. 

“We live in a time now where people are more disconnected with themselves and the environment. And fragrance, especially, is a great tool to instantly bring us back to our senses,” said the Others co-founder. Doyle said the brand has already received interest from Estée Lauder’s incubation team, and the brand is exploring scents that target other emotional arenas like sexual wellness. 

And it’s not just fragrance. Beauty as a whole has attempted to bridge cosmetics with mental health through both products and IRL experiences. To promote its Heal the Way launch, Snif hosted a workshop in May with Alex Elle and Peoplehood, the New York City-based wellness company started by SoulCycle founders Elizabeth Cutler and Julie Rice. That same month, Selena Gomez hosted Rare Beauty’s third annual Mental Health Summit, which was attended by U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy. Even while the beauty industry itself has been criticized for being the source of anxiety by upholding strict beauty norms, such a strategy can be lucrative; Rare Beauty is reportedly seeking a valuation of $2 billion as it explores a sale. 

“Beauty can be so empowering. It can make you feel confident and unique. It’s a great tool, but on the flip side, it can also unfortunately do the complete opposite,” said Alison Romash, global head of marketing and sales at Orebella. “It’s really the responsibility of beauty brands to uplift, inspire and elevate the wellbeing of all communities.”

The increased awareness around mental health comes at a time when conditions like depression are on the rise. A 2023 Gallup poll found a record 29% of Americans reported having been diagnosed with depression at some point in their lives, with rates especially high among women and young adults. At the same time, a 2023 report by the National Center for Health Workforce Analysis found that more than half of the U.S. population lives in an area with a shortage of mental health professionals. 

Purchasing a wellness-adjacent fragrance at Sephora or Ulta poses far fewer barriers than booking a therapy session. But uplifting scents may not be able to provide more than short-term relief, Bacow cautions.  

“The risk is in thinking it’s really going to be a game-changer or have a long-lasting impact,“ said Bacow. “It can lead to disappointment. It can lead to people spending money and wasting money.”