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Perfumery:
5 Common Mistakes & Solutions
by: Dr. Ziad El-Desoki "The Founder of Perfumer Archive" | Updated: May 25th, 2025
Mistakes are common in perfumery, especially for beginners and intermediates. Avoiding the big ones is essential to reaching the next level in the craft.
Not all mistakes are about how to blend; some of the biggest ones have nothing to do with the craft itself.
That’s why many popular and senior perfumers aren’t necessarily the best at creative blending,
they just know how to avoid the major pitfalls.
It’s like when I used to play volleyball, my coach once told me that the best spiker isn’t the one who scores the most points, but the one who avoids mistakes.
In this quick article 👇 I’ll share some of the biggest mistakes to avoid.
1. Starting aimlessly:
What should the end result look like?
When will we know that we achieved what we wanted?
You have to specify your aim for the creation/project you are working on.
Aims can include (smell, performance, price, stability, safety).
Here’s how:
a. Make it clear.
b. Summarize your brief into a few words.
c. Saturate your words with alternatives.
d. Smell scents that align with some of these words.
e. Take a break (sleep).
f. Start creating the next day.
Always start late finish early
2. Adding ineffective increases:
Let’s say you added 0.5% coumarin to a formula → then you smelled it → you felt it needs more coumarin → so you decided to increase it to 0.6%. (That’s a waste of time.)
If you need to increase it, double the amount and re-evaluate.
So:
-
From not obvious in the formula to obvious → Double the amount (100% increase).
-
From already obvious to very obvious → Increase by half the amount (50% increase), then re-evaluate.
3. Adding More then regretting:
You always have the option to add, but no option to remove.
As you know, fragrance materials aren't cheap, and blending a 50-line formula is exhausting.
So, would you ruin the entire formula due to a tiny error?
If you are working on a formula with a new material that you haven't used before or didn't try in this style of formulas before, don't add 5% of it to see if it's too much or needs to be increased.
Instead,
start with 0.1%, then evaluate. If it's not obvious, increase it gradually as mentioned in point 2.
However, if you add the new material at line 50 of the formula and realize it's too much,
you'll have to start over.
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Don't buy us a cup of coffee!
Instead,
Support the goal.
We won't drink coffee.
Instead,
We will add new formulas, more articles, and new GCMS reports,
so you can grow your perfumery skills.
4. Working Directly with the Scale:
Warm up your scale, leave it in the ready position for 5–10 minutes before using it.
Check its accuracy before starting.
I use a small plastic bottle that weighs exactly 1 gram, and I weigh it first to make sure the scale is working properly.
A tiny mistake here can ruin a 1-ton order.
Let’s say you created a formula on a cold scale, so the weights are off.
You document the formula, send a sample to the client, and they fall in love with the fragrance.
Later, production uses your documented formula to make the bulk.
The client receives it, smells it, and says, “This is not what I smelled the first time, these are two different fragrances.”
So here’s what you must do:
-
Warm up your scale.
-
Make a 100 ml sample before producing the bulk for the first time; because if you create a 40-line formula in just 10–20 grams, the percentages won't be that accurate.
5. Not Avoiding Contamination:
Contamination = bad formulation, wasted materials, and damaged resources.
Newbies don't realize how a small amount of aromatic contaminant can change the vibe of the formula you made. Your creation may be a loss due to this contaminant.
a. Use disposable tools as much as you can.
b. Clean lab tools with alcohol.
c. Have a little bit of OCD.
That’s all I can say; this really comes down to your personal hygiene.
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