Does in-house controversy affect your opinion on frags?

[Dorje123]

After a long bout of anosmia (thank you, covid) I am slowly returning to this hobby. I thought I'd start with some samples again, and House of Sillage has been on my "to try" list for a while (despite the garish bottle designs).

I ran a search to get a feel for the general view of their frags and to help select my samples, only to discover that there is a lot of controversy around the founder. This is certainly not a company people are happy to work for, wth many calling it a toxic environment.* I also recall the same was said about working for Bond No. 9.* No doubt in a competitive space, business is cut-throat and pressures are high, but I feel iffy now about supporting the company with my hard-earned money if the employees are being ill-treated.
*These are glassdoor reviews from employees that came up in a regular search and I have no idea if they're accurate; however there are a lot of them so it seems true.

It got me thinking- are you bothered by the in-house drama and controversy behind the juice, or are you able to separate the problematic owners from the scent?
Also, if anyone has sampled their frags, please let me know your thoughts on them. I found very few reviews!

Some of the best creative types are also hard for many people to work with. That said, if people are downright abused or the guy is just a clown I won't buy. One example of that is Tesla cars.

 

[enframing]

Bosses can be dicks. Some verbally abusive. Some of the problem, IME, is that many younger employees have very thin skins. "Grow a pair.' Ovaries or balls. Physical abuse, well, that's something else entirely. I would avoid a house whose boss was violent towards employees. By violent I don't mean trashing papers and throwing tantrums, I mean actual physical violence.

 

[StylinLA]

The house in question is of a type that most Basenoters eschew. That's generalizing a bit. They are very pricey with no real perfume pedigree in a manner of speaking. They seem to be kind of running the Bond No 9 playbook to a degree. They have developed very unique, pricey looking packaging for the women's perfume line which admittedly would look cool on a dresser.

It is owned and run by a woman and she seems to be the focus of all employee angst. As I said earlier, I don't take complaints in sites like Glass Door or Yelp as gospel, but there is indeed a slew of people ripping on the place and indeed many seem to leave.

That being said, if they made something I really loved, it probably wouldn't change my mind. Being an a**hole is not an illegal business practice.
If the environment is truly awful, that will catch up with the company having nothing to do with sales.

Doing a cursory look around at reviews of some of their scents, it seems like they probably make some nice, fairly potent stuff, but none of them seem to standout as "theirs." Maybe I'm wrong. It's a fairly young company and they are competing at a price point that's tough to sway people easily.

 

[N.CAL Fragrance Reviewer]

Personally I judge the overall scent and not the noise from the background a house may give.

 

[_Nicolas_]

Maybe, but imo the truth is likely not so clear. In the past he's credited perfumers, but I think its likely the perfumer is also a bit of a creative director and liaison with the fragrance company, whose in-house perfumers are really doing a lot of the work. Its possible Roja no longer needs a perfumer to be a liaison and can work with the fragrance company more directly. No matter who is credited you can smell a lot of similarities in Roja and also Puredistance perfumes, which are made by Robertet. No matter what you think of the arrangement, Robertet has some of the best perfumery materials in the world, both naturals and aromachemicals, and the truth is Roja's and Puredistance perfumes do use very expensive materials that, imo, actually justify their price. If you're going to pick on houses for offering questionable value, there are far more egregious examples like PdM, Creed, and many more. Not saying they aren't good and don't use top-end aromachemicals, they do, but they aren't anywhere close to Roja or Puredistance in terms of using high quality naturals yet their prices are comparable. I know for sure some Rojas use real ambergris, and their musk accords are MUCH closer to real deer musk, civet and castoreum than anyone else in the industry. And nobody is even close in terms of citrus topnotes either. IMO you do get what you pay for with both Roja and Puredistance.

Interesting, but Roja also seems to get accused of plagiarism a lot with his releases. One that seems to come up a lot is Diaghilev and its strong similarity to Mitsouko Extrait. I also love to smell fragrances with good ingredients, but there seems to be some excessive focussing on materials occasionally these days and not enough emphasis on composition for my taste. I suppose I'll never find out as I'm not prepared to spend over a tenner on a millilitre of Diaghilev. But some of the rarer early Guerlains are now going for £4 a ml and up, and I doubt Roja has anything approaching the compositional skill of Jacques, but this is all speculation.

 

[Dorje123]

Interesting, but Roja also seems to get accused of plagiarism a lot with his releases. One that seems to come up a lot is Diaghilev and its strong similarity to Mitsouko Extrait. I also love to smell fragrances with good ingredients, but there seems to be some excessive focussing on materials occasionally these days and not enough emphasis on composition for my taste. I suppose I'll never find out as I'm not prepared to spend over a tenner on a millilitre of Diaghilev. But some of the rarer early Guerlains are now going for £4 a ml and up, and I doubt Roja has anything approaching the compositional skill of Jacques, but this is all speculation.

Way overstated, imo. I would agree most Roja fragrances are based on classic French perfumery, but just because something is done in a classic style doesn't mean it's a clone. Every house has chypres, fougeres, orientals, etc. How many new releases are totally novel? Nearly zero, ime... I'd also argue all of Roja's compositions are exceptionally well done, which makes sense as Robertet is the company actually making the fragrances... they are top tier in terms of both materials and composition.

There's so many more egregious examples of clones and charlatans, picking on Roja is just trendy and also misguided. It's just internet-fed BS. It's certainly the case Roja isn't the place to go for modern fragrances that use aromachemicals as main notes, with a couple exceptions like Elysium, but that's more along the lines of personal preferences. If you want to spend $300+ on mostly chemical bombs there's other brands that offer that.

Anyways, you don't have to buy the highest priced offerings like Diaghilev, the PC line is often on sale for <$2/mL, and are exceptionally well done, high value fragrances that are also a bit more modern vs the Parfums... Well worth trying, imo.

 

[WindsweptDaze]

There are so many perfume houses out there and so much to choose from, why waste money on a product from a company or creative that you know has values different than your own? I'm a firm believer in voting with my dollar.

 

[davidcalgary29]

There's so many more egregious examples of clones and charlatans, picking on Roja is just trendy and also misguided.

And fun for the whole family! It's an added perk that you get when you spend over $500 for a bottle of perfume.

That being said, Fetish is outstanding and worthy of its stratospheric price. Burlington 1819, too.

I carefully consider brand practices and reputation so that I can use them to justify my own particular prejudices and shopping decisions.
Kidding! Sort of.

 

[the_good_life]

I'll only wear perfume by a fascist if he's dead and his name is Francois Coty ;-).
Beyond that I agree there's so much out there one wouldn't need to support abusive employers.
It get's tricky of course, if you're favorite nose/artist/musician turns out to be a total creep ;-). I sure hope Max Ernst was a nice guy, I prefer him over Picasso...and thankfully never liked Wagner much.

 

[Akahina]

I care more if the house supports fascism, racism or anti-gay agendas. Bottle design matters too. I would never put anything on my shelf that looked like a toy for a 3 year old. I won't even sample it in a store.

 

[davidcalgary29]

I'll only wear perfume by a fascist if he's dead and his name is Francois Coty ;-).
Beyond that I agree there's so much out there one wouldn't need to support abusive employers.
It get's tricky of course, if you're favorite nose/artist/musician turns out to be a total creep ;-). I sure hope Max Ernst was a nice guy, I prefer him over Picasso...and thankfully never liked Wagner much.

...

I care more if the house supports fascism, racism or anti-gay agendas. Bottle design matters too. I would never put anything on my shelf that looked like a toy for a 3 year old. I won't even sample it in a store.
View attachment 337849

That bottle does look kind of fun, though...

 

[the_good_life]

I care more if the house supports fascism, racism or anti-gay agendas. Bottle design matters too. I would never put anything on my shelf that looked like a toy for a 3 year old. I won't even sample it in a store.
View attachment 337849

Well, you just know that's gonna smell awful...

 

[sjg3839]

Naw

 

[RPLens]

This is certainly not a company people are happy to work for, wth many calling it a toxic environment.*

Every single company or workspace has a certain toxic environment.
But there are levels to this.
And not everyone is affected, office politics can be pretty disgusting.

I've worked for a multinational with a huge toxic environment, leading to multiple people quitting the company or being ill for months.
In the end, most of the management was replaced, because they were so insanely incompetent and disgusting.

My current working environment is peanuts compared to what I experienced in the past.
But still, even in this company, multiple people are crashing and there is certainly some drama.
A few idiots in key roles is enough to ruin a perfectly fine company.

Would I avoid House of Sillage for this? No.
Because toxicity is everywhere, just as hypocrisy.
Now if I would buy a sample of their expensive perfumes, and it smells like cheap trash, I would probably double down in my review and destroy it completely.
Knowing that a toxic environment can never create good products or services.
The sales guys won't like that.

The beauty sector has a lot of drama and toxicity anyway, just look at the horrendous behaviour of some SA's.

 

[RPLens]

Example roja being a charlatan yet still buying his stuff. Blows my mind

I've been extremely critical of Roja Parfums.
Mostly because I am tremendously underwhelmed by his compositions.
Amber Aoud being the pinnacle of overpriced *****.

This is the guy that is publicly denouncing designer fragrances, yet his Elysium smells cheap compared to Bleu de Chanel Parfum.
But if he would create a rich and thick Bleu de Chanel type of fragrance, I would have no problem buying it.

 

[davidcalgary29]

I've been extremely critical of Roja Parfums.
Mostly because I am tremendously underwhelmed by his compositions.
Amber Aoud being the pinnacle of overpriced *****.

This is the guy that is publicly denouncing designer fragrances, yet his Elysium smells cheap compared to Bleu de Chanel Parfum.
But if he would create a rich and thick Bleu de Chanel type of fragrance, I would have no problem buying it.

Roja Dove is ripe for criticism because of their ridiculous price points and outrageous pretentions -- not to mention all of the questions surrounding Roger Bird's talents, authorship, and true input into the brand. That being said, they do have a few outstanding fragrances. I'm sure I've mentioned it in this thread, but Fetish quickly grew to be a favourite as I finished up my first sample, and is now one of my top bottles of the year.

 

[bl00drunzcold]

I won’t really let in-house controversy affect my opinion on fragrances I already own, but it’ll make me think about or stop purchasing anything new entirely. Take Sixteen92 for example. Indie house that I have multiples from and supported until the owner ran the business in to the ground. Not sending orders out for months or never, deleting any critical comments of the way things were going off of her Facebook group, kicking people out of the Facebook group and blocking those members/paying customers asking about orders that never shipped. Sending dead tracking numbers to stop people from filing claims with PayPal while blaming usps for “misplacing” shipments over and over. All this while continuing to take money from new unsuspecting customers. That stopped me from purchasing from her and I haven’t since 2019. I still think some of the ones I have are fantastic but the company is dead to me.

 

[cheapimitation]

Interesting question, as a general philosophical statement I think the onus on consuming ethically is too often put in the lap of the consumer when really the problem is systemic and individual consumers don't really have that much power to change things as it is basically impossible to exist outside the system and/or consume everything ethically and keep track of all the origins and processes that led to the end product of our consumption. Yes vote with your dollars sounds good, but there isn't enough transparency and the system is too complex for this to really be effective in any meaningful way.

That said, I think we all draw our own line somewhere, if hearing that the brand owner is an ass who treats her employees poorly turns you off, that's good enough reason to stay away for you! For me, those cupcake bottles and the brand name are more than enough to keep me away. I've been a vegetarian most of my life because I'm just too disgusted by the way the meat industry treats living things as commodities to support that. But I'm not under any illusion this will ever stop or that anyone else should be vegetarian as well, I'm sure there are things I consume that some others would find fault with so I don't really like getting into the ethical consumption one-up manship.

Personally, I don't think coming across poor employee reviews would necessarily be enough to make me want to boycott a brand. Likewise if a creative director said something unsavory or offensive I would probably look past it if they otherwise run an ethical business (hello Dolce and Gabbana). Heck, I'm not even bothered in the least by Roja. I think the line between perfumer/creative director is blurry anyway as experienced top tier perfumers would likely have assistants put the perfume together, or maybe even AI. It's not like those top perfumers are in a little workshop compounding and tincturing themselves. They are more likely just writing formulas, giving feedback and signing off on the final product. Whatever Roja does, I'm sure he's involved in the creations and he does have the background experience in the perfume industry to back that up.

So I was thinking what is enough to make me boycott a brand. More and more I am bothered by the luxury conglomerate monopolies and I hate to think how my money is stuffing the pockets of billionaires. It wouldn't be that hard for me to avoid all LVMH brands unless they do come for Estee Lauder. It's in the back of my mind when considering LV fragrances, whose overpriced and cheap execution make it easy to boycott anyway. A little harder when it comes to Guerlain, but they never spoke to me in a major way and their bottle/price change basically confirmed I'll never be buying from them.

General fakery like Creed is annoying but I think that's more a brand identity not aligning with my values, the kind of person Creed is trying to market to is not me. If a brand was involved in some environmental disaster, let's say a rainforest was cleared for oud in all those Initio oud fragrances, that would be a big deal breaker for me (it's a joke, there's no oud in those fragrances!).

Anyway, it's late and I fear I've gone on too long! Follow your heart, there's more than enough great brands out there if spending your money on this one bothers you then look elsewhere for brands that align with your values.

 

[Salumbre]

Unless they become notorious for eating babies or killing us gays, my answer is no.

 

[fermented]

I do not agree with the people who say that unethical labor practices are fine "because employees always have the option to quit" - that's like saying it's fine to smash all of your husband or wife's belongings because they can just get a divorce if they don't like it.

It is also absurd to claim that "if the [work] environment is really truly bad, that will catch up to company and kill it soon enough" - companies with legendary labor violations have historically included some of the largest multi-national corporations on Earth, including Apple and Amazon.