The Perfume Shoppe opens in Rehoboth

Ever since she discovered niche perfumes in the 1990s, Cindy Carey, co-owner of The Perfume Shoppe on Penny Lane in Rehoboth, said she’s fallen in love with the complex scents.

“It’s liquid emotion,” Carey said. “Niche perfumes are made by true perfumers around the world and are not mass-produced.”

That’s because these perfumes are made from all-natural ingredients in a very labor-intensive process, she said, and noted one of her perfumes required as many as 700,000 jasmine flowers for one small bottle.

“In the interest of mass-producing, a lot of the perfumers use ingredients that are synthetically engineered,” Cindy’s husband and business partner Asher Carey said. “But you can never re-create the natural essence.”

That’s why niche perfumes are so complex, Cindy said, because every perfume should have three layers, including top, heart and base notes. Top notes refer to the initial smell of the perfume, or the initial impact it makes. Heart notes, she said, are the middle notes, when the scent has been applied to the skin.

“Finally, it will settle into base notes,” Cindy said. “So it evolves, which is kind of fun.”

When potential customers come to the perfume boutique the visit will start with a consultation, Asher said, advising potential clients to set time aside for the visit to talk about what they are looking for and to allow scents to develop before purchasing.

“They’re usually in here at least 20 minutes, because we want to match the perfume with more than just the top notes,” he said.

Despite being packed wall-to-wall with all kinds of perfumes, from floral to spicy to oriental scents, Manager Cassandra Parker pointed out that the air inside The Perfume Shoppe is remarkably free of lingering odors.

Since these perfumes come from natural ingredients instead of synthetics, Parker said scents will stay on the skin, but not overpower the air surrounding a person wearing a niche perfume.

“It won’t stay in the elevator when you leave,” she said, referring to one of the bolder scents.

The complexity and diversity as well as the evolution of these scents after application, Cindy said, is what makes wearing niche perfumes so enjoyable. She said typically consultations begin with asking a customer what he or she likes, offering up several scents with that profile, and continuing consultation while the scents develop.

“We can do light, we can do bold and we can layer scents,” Cindy said. “What you wear to work may be different than what you wear to the beach.”

The Perfume Shoppe is located in Penny Lane, 42 Rehoboth Ave., and is open from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., daily.  For details contact 302-226-2444 or go to www.theperfumeshoppe.com.