Merit Launches Their First Fragrance

Six months after launching, the brains behind minimalist makeup and skin brand Merit decided the brand needed a fragrance. “It wasn’t a very logical business move,” Aila Morin, the brand’s chief marketing officer, says with a laugh. “But we saw a white space. Frankly, there weren’t a lot of fragrances speaking to women in our age group, so we started concepting the Merit scent.”

Morin describes fragrance landscape at the time as either “very gourmand” scents that targeted Gen Z or linear, single-story fragrances that “smelled the exact same when you first sprayed them and eight hours later.” Neither of these were something the Merit woman—who the CMO describes as a woman in her 30s or 40s who is looking for something thoughtful, vintage-inspired, but with a modern edge. Three years later, after almost abandoning the project more than a few times, Retrospect Extrait de Parfum is finally here.

But before we dive into the present launch, we have rewind 2022, when Morin and her team almost abandoned the yet-unnamed scent. And then came a meeting with French perfumer Fanny Bol. While the fragrance industry’s consumer is mostly people who identify as women, the noses making the product are—somewhat surprisingly—a small group of men. Morin found the meeting with Bol refreshing, not only because “we had a lot of the same references,” but also because she was the exact demographic the scent was intended for.

“We created 200 different versions of the fragrance before we settled on the one in the bottle,” Bol shares of Retrospect. “But I have to say, we’re not too far from the original idea.” The final—and presumably, first—juice has those vintage notes you’ll recognize oh-so-well: vanilla, jasmine, and rose, but instead of pulling the exact notes used in your grandmother’s perfume, Bol and Morin opted for different varietals or synthetics to give a modern and fresh approach.

Another vintage element of the scent is that it evolves throughout the day. “It opens quite soft and fresh,” says Bol. “Like what you would want in the morning. By midday, when you are at work, it’s hitting the floral notes and is more traditional. Then, by evening it’s turned sexy, with a little moss, a little musk, a little vanilla, a little wood.”

When Morin—and Merit founder Katherine Power—realized that it echoed a modern woman’s day perfectly, that’s when they knew the juice was perfect. “We realized it could really live with you over the course of the day, and felt right in all these different situations,” Morin says. “Nobody wants to smell sexy dropping their kids off at school, but they do want to at home in the evening with their partner after the kids are asleep. Women have to code switch into so many situations in a day, and this scent really moves with you.”

Retrospect Extrait de Parfum is now available for pre-order and will be available to for purchase on October 22nd. In the meantime, shop more Merit Beauty below.