Top-20  Best-selling Fragrances for women in the USA 2011

By popular demand, after the Top-20  Best-selling Fragrances for women in France for 2011, which many readers  mailed me to say was an eye-opener, I decided to post what the popular choices  (based on bulk of sales) during the year 2011 in the American market are. A sort  of two-faces-of Janus project, if you wish.

I had prefaced my French post  by saying that people with an interest in perfumes imagine the French to be  wildly sophisticated when it comes to fragrances; perhaps it comes with the  territory, having so many options, though to be honest the US market is by far  more populated. And yet, it’s more of a form of branding, a subject on which the  French have excelled while Americans have languished. As one of my friends in  marketing says “USA branded itself as star& stripes, hamburgers, NBA,  Hollywood and big-tit tanned blondes from California”. Not exactly premium,  you’d argue. And yet, this is exactly why we love to dump down on  American culture, even Americans themselves.

The USA as an uber-democratic,  nascent nation decidedly branded itself as catering to the mass, with  their Walmarts and their Costcos and For All Humanity jeans, in constrast to the  largely still medieval-farmer/bourgeois mentality of the French with their small  boutiques. Both societies have their elites, socio-economic as well as  intellectual, but whereas one of them is proud of it, the other is  self-effacing, almost embarassed to see it mentioned. See where I’m  getting?

Robert Redford & Jane Fonda in Barefoor in the Park (1967) via Mary Lou Cinnamon

 

The Americans also routinely receive flack  from perfumefreaks because they’re supposed to like “clean” perfumes, i.e.  shampoo & laundry detergent smelling stuff we turn our noses on. (I assure  you that that is better than smelling the bad breath of a typical  Gitannes-smoking French, but that’s fodder for another discussion). And yet, I  can’t erase from my mind Sarah Jessica Parker’s comment, while explaining her  layering technique of perfumes and how she envisioned her first perfume in her  own name, Lovely. It was in Chandler Burr’s The Perfect Scent,  where Parker revealed that she loved the smell of body odor, strong sweet musk,  and general all-around dirtiness and concluded that “Americans, we love our body  odour”; she was already brainstorming for her “B.O scent for everywoman” (which  turned out to be the quirky Covet).

To revert to perfumes in the  real market perspective, as my reader Victoria commented: “I still think this [French] list is a bit fancier than the top 20 American scents would be. I’d  imagine that list would be filled with Britney Spears, JLo, Pink Sugar, and  other generic fragrances.” But as Mals from Muse in Wooden Shoes says “Chances  are, these are the things that your college roommate, your bank teller, your  Aunt Becky, and the cashier at your grocery store are wearing, and they don’t  smell so bad…”

So come with me, dear readers, to see which 20 perfumes  really make America tilt (in no particular order). And if you want to  contrast it with what happened an only two short years ago, check this 2009 fragrance best-sellers (US and France) list out. 

Chanel Coco Mademoiselle (this tops the list, predictably as it was the US  Chanel headquarters who insisted on its creation and is topping the list for  some years now)

Burberry Body
Calvin Klein Euphoria
Chanel No.5
Chanel Chance
Chanel Chance Eau Fraiche
Christian  Dior J’Adore
Clinique Aromatics Elixir
Clinique Happy
D&G Light  Blue
Donna Karan Cashmere Mist
Estee Lauder Beautiful
Estee Lauder Knowing
Estee Lauder Sensuous  Nude
Estee Lauder Pleasures
Fendi Fan di Fendi
Justin Bieber Someday
Prada Candy
Taylor Swift Wonderstruck
Thierry Mugler Angel

thanks to Laure Philips  for info