“We are on a quest to define the new luxury beauty. We want to bring some magic back into the category,” Marco Parsiegla, Chief Executive Officer of Amouage, reflects on a sunny afternoon in Muscat, Oman, the company’s headquarters and also the site of its in-house fragrance production. Perfume is, by its very nature, a thing of magic. It's a collision of materials—be they synthetic, natural, or bioengineered—in a beaker. Sometimes the act is more calculated, other times more impulsive, but the final end result finds its way to a blotter at the nose’s (or consumer’s) discretion.
But Amouage’s take on said sorcery, that chemical alchemy, is a love letter to craftsmanship. Born in 1983 on the insistence oaf Qaboos Bin Said, the Sultan of Oman, to spread the “The Gift of Kings,” or gifts of Oman, to the wider world, the company began in the hands of Prince Sayyid Hamad bin Hamoud al bu Said. Christopher Chong and David Crickmore came on as the Creative Director and CEO of the house from 2006 until 2019, when Renaud Salmon joined as Creative Director and Chief Experience Officer, the same year as Parsiegla. With their impressive trajectories in prestige and luxury for Procter & Gamble, Coty, and Havas Group, Salmon and Parsiegla have demonstrated an impressive expansion plan for the brand thus far, with the results to match.
“From the very beginning, Oman has always described itself as the door to the world, and so it was also with Amouage from the very beginning,” Parsiegla says. The name Amouage marries the French word “amour” (love) with Arabic ﻣَﻮﺟَﺔ. (pronounced mawja), which means wave. “That wave of emotions is still there today,” he adds. Describing the evolution of the business as a seeding phase in the early ’80s to international growth over the last 20 years, Parsiegla sees its next chapter as the “bloom” stage. “It's going back to the roots. We took a decision to actually take more inspiration back from Oman and bring them to the world,” he explains.
In the first half of 2022, the company reported $100 million+ in retail sales and 50% in revenue growth (55% in organic revenue growth), with US and APAC becoming its biggest markets, accounting for 20% of sales. The former is its fastest-growing and the latter its largest market. The US accounts for 9% of that, which given the launch of Amouage Americas in 2021, displays an immense consumer appetite for the brand in a short time period. Its other core markets have been showing growth rates between 30-40%, with specifically South Korea, China, UK, Italy, and Nigeria proving as big growth opportunities.
Remarking on the drivers for this growth, Parsiegla pinpoints four pillars: the creative power of its creations, geographic expansion, a communication-earned online strategy, and agility, in part due to their fully integrated value stream. “We see ourselves much more like a manufacturer than a big producer. This is coming with an entrepreneurial setup in mind: risk taking and seizing the opportunities there are in the marketplace,” he proclaims.
From the onset, the brand hoped to fuse craftsmanship and an admiration of Omani materials, especially frankincense, rock rose, and ambergris, with Western sensibilities. While the general modus operandi of the industry has been that certain regions will favor specific types of scents—oud-heavy fragrances in the Middle East, sweeter fragrances in the West, lightweight formulations in the East—Amouage’s track record shows a vastly different perspective. “We're actually seeing a little bit of the opposite,” Parsiegla states. Silver Oud, a potent woody leather scent, was originally launched with intent for the Middle East market, but resonated so well that the brand rolled it out globally. The Renaissance collection, a “more contemporary take,” was received well in the Middle East, while bestsellers in China are Memoir and Epic, aromatic leather and woody amber creations. The key takeaway? Craft fragrances in line with your creative vision, rather than preconceived and partially outdated consumer taste references.
“A growing market presence can carry some risks when it comes to the creative vision for Amouage as it might be tempting to become ubiquitous and think that we need to adopt a more mainstream language when it comes to our identity,” Salmon remarks. “I actually pushed the creative direction in the opposite direction: as we get exposed to more clients, I believe that it is crucial to reinforce the house essence and stand for something very unique and simple to appreciate in the perfume industry. A consistency in our creation philosophy. Every day, I strive to stay committed to what we are doing and not what others are doing.”
Take for instance the company’s range of Attars, a format of 100% pure oil fragrance native to the Middle East, the use of which dates back to ancient India. In the hands of Salmon and Parsiegla, blended with the modern palette in mind and presented in sleek, modern dropper bottles, they have become one of the brand’s bestsellers, as have the Exceptional Extraits with industry-leading concentrations of 45-56%. For reference, usual concentration levels lie around 15-20% for an eau de parfum or 20-30% for an extrait. The maturation process is more akin to whiskey or wine production rather than the mass operations of the mainstream fragrance industry, with 8 weeks of maturation and 16 weeks of maceration. Getting global clearance for the Attars took two years of effort, given the restrictions on levels of raw material concentrations and shipping regulations.
“It all starts with the product, the creation, and the art. We actually overinvest in our products, starting from the ingredients. Our strategy and objective is to become the leader in the luxurious long-lasting fragrances category,” Parsiegla states. It’s no coincidence that one of their most well-known fragrances, Interlude for Man, is nicknamed “The Blue Beast.” For Interlude 53, the duo took the bestseller and pumped up its concentration to 53%. “We were actually quite surprised with the journey ourselves. When we started experimenting and dialed up the concentration, working with the perfumer Pierre Negrin, it actually became more round through the longer maturation process,” Parsiegla recalls. “In the consumer reaction, Interlude lovers and connoisseurs upgraded Interlude 53, but very importantly, it pulled new consumers in as well.”
Such dedication to the art of perfumery comes at a price—the Exceptional Extraits start at $430 for 50ml, Attars start at $540 for 12ml, while the starting price for its main line eau de parfums is $265 for 50ml—but the Amouage team reports a 25% higher spend per item among its customers. It’s indicative of the booming prestige fragrance category: in the US, the prestige fragrance category saw 13% growth, and its global value is set to reach over $19 billion by 2026.
For Amouage, clearly, the luxury is in the details. As Salmon states: “Modern luxury is a luxury aware of time and circumstances. Today, it is a luxury that reveals the house’s sincerity: a careful and thoughtful approach of creation and of the relationship with its clients, thus defying the recent trend of overshadowing the actual perfumes and interactions with entertainment marketing. A modern luxury client does not expect brand names to be the singular defining standard of quality.”
The latest launches continue the Amouage lineage of extravagant raw material combinations delivered in bold, lush fragrance compositions. As Parsiegla notes, “We want to help our clients stand out with highly creative, perfume creations which are playing to the best in the field. We are not a house for discreet users.” The Library Collection Opus XIV Royal Tobacco, created by Cécile Zarokian, features aromatic notes of cardamom, basil, anise, licorice, and fenugreek layered with tobacco, rose, osmanthus, and lavender on a base of oud, birch tar, and bourbon vanilla. The perfumer also composed Saffron Hamra, which mixes the earthy, sweet tones of the spice with rose and smoky cade oil for a deep, warm floral. Overture Woman is a boozy (courtesy of a calvados accord) leather and amber scent, devised by Annick Ménardo, paying homage to the grandeur of the opera, with the olfactory drama to match. “If you look at our total portfolio, about 40% of our current business is coming from creations which were launched throughout the last three years. So there's clearly a very strong, positive resonance that has created global demand,” Parsiegla states. Many customers are also layering different Attars and Extraits for their own unique creation. “What we're seeing is people want to have a much more personal interaction and choice of fragrances than there was before. It's not about belonging to a certain luxury group or house or brand,” he remarks.
The bottles bear metal caps and the shape of an Omani dagger for the traditional rectangle bottles (for unisex and men’s fragrances), all decorated with a single Swarovski crystal (or more for those craving a limited-edition bottle). The caps on the women’s fragrance bottles started out in the shape of a classical pointed mosque dome before transitioning into its current rounded shape echoing the Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque, the largest mosque in Oman. “The visual identity clearly reveals our house’s and Oman’s ethos behind the choices of colors, materials, shapes, typography and other details: warmth, generosity, solarity, open privacy, abundance, natural richness, and more,” Salmon comments. “Even if these artistic choices are built on a rather simple and straightforward palette that comes from the observation of life, architecture, art and nature in Oman, their sequence at Amouage is unique and can make a strong impression as opposed to when they exist separately.” These values are reflected in the ample concentrations of the formulations, the contrasts within the perfume compositions, and the vast array of genres and creative interpretations in the Amouage portfolio.
It’s not just inside the bottle where the magic happens. Amouage’s retail presence is an equal display of beauty, currently available across 80 countries,12 stand-alone boutiques, and 1,000 retail outlets. Parsiegla states that 80% of sales are still in physical stores. In a time where most brands might be shunning physical retail for the ease of online, the company opened its luxurious flagship boutique in Muscat at the Mall of Oman. “We had lots of debates around that. We see ourselves as an experience business. The more senses you have in an experience, the more touch points, the better. Whereas retail in the past was much more transactional, now it is about an immersion place into the brand itself,” he says.
Created in collaboration with Héroïne design agency, the space was inspired by an eclipse in the Omani desert. At the center of the store is a white orb, split through in the middle with a gold-leaf interior housing its Attar line. The structure sits in the middle of the store like the sculptural spaceship in Denis Villeneuve’s Arrival, an unknown but captivating entity luring in the passerby. Travertine battlements line each side of the store, housing screens that display the work of digital artists. For the store opening, the artwork was “Eclipse” by French director Thomas Vanz, an exploration of the intersectional dynamics between scent, light, and music, backed by an original soundtrack courtesy of Belgian music producer Copal. The screens also change in correspondence to the fragrances that customers are sampling, echoing a synaesthesiac approach to scent discovery. “Amouage is not about being literal. As a creative director, I like to leave room for interpretation rather than forcing personal ideas onto our clientele,” Salmon notes.
The fragrance sampling process has also received an upgrade from standard practices. Instead of paper blotters, curious noses dip a Qalam—a feather pen historically used in Islamic calligraphy to register the country’s gold trade records—into the Attar bottles to then transfer to their pulse points. Parsiegla states the intent is not just to showcase the brand’s vision and offer an immersion into its product offerings, but also to act as a hub for the Amouage community and events. Equally, the company’s Visitor’s Centre takes attendees inside the world of fragrance making, from its perfumes and candles to bath products, while showcasing the history of the brand. The hospitality is paying off, with its own retail operations growing by 33% over the last year.
The company is passionate about having this immersion not just at a retail level, but online as well. Award-winning fragrance writer Dariush Alavi penned a fable entitled The Fullness of Paradise for readers to dive into on the brand’s online presence. “It’s very important to be multisensorial, experiential, and doing that in a modern way. For us, this means working with the creative collective, that is for us a very important element to drive the desirability,” Parsiegla said. Another example: the brand partnered with online content creator The Tingle Perfumer on a 52-minute ASMR journey into Amouage’s fragrance creation process, racking up nearly 1.4 million views on YouTube. Parsiegla adds: “It's very important to be credible, relevant, and at the same time also educational, especially in our field where we have a lot of connoisseurs and experts. It’s moving to a much more transparent and conversational dialogue.” As for its marketing strategy, again, high value creation is taking priority over mass coverage, with the company using earned instead of paid influencer strategies. Its e-commerce growth is up 43% this year, and it is ranked as a top 10 brand on Tmall since launching with the online giant in August 2021.
Despite its royal lineage and immersion in Omani history, Parsiegla is opposed to letting Amouage get too comfortable. “We do not want to be a heritage brand, which gets dusted and ends up in a museum. For us, it's all about taking our vision and bringing it to the next generation, modernizing it. That's where we see such a great reaction from the consumers around the world because there is depth and richness in the brand, but it's done in a very contemporary undertaking,” he proclaims. Salmon and Parsiegla are currently working on packaging and sample kit redesigns, including a more abstract painterly approach to its boxing components, and opening spaces in cities such as Milan, Shanghai, and New York. With 2023 marking Amouage’s 40th anniversary, the brand is sure to commemorate the occasion in trademark opulence.
Most recently, the company signed a partnership with Oman’s Ministry of Heritage and Tourism to develop a UNESCO World Heritage site called Wadi Dawkah, which will house hundreds of frankincense trees across 5 kilometers in Sultanate of Oman in the Southern Governate of Dhofar, ensuring its impact goes beyond the product. “Thanks to this exceptional arrangement, this is an opportunity to create a compelling tourism and cultural destination and drive the international promotion of the unique treasures of the Dhofar region,” comments Sayyid Khalid bin Hamad Al Busaidi, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Amouage. “Respecting nature means protecting the ecosystems that have gifted us, and by doing so we ensure that generations to come can continue to enjoy and experience the beauty of our fragrances.”
Growth figures, revenue, and sales figures are of course vital parts of the industry’s operations, but the worldwide adoration and love for the house of Amouage among its customers is the result of an elusive formula that many struggle to define. It’s the type of connoisseurship that truly treasures fragrance and the hands that make it, for the noses that cherish the ritual of scent. And even in the world of high-end luxury fragrance, that’s something you can’t put a price on.
