Where do Perfume Ingredients come From?

 Natural ingredients—flowers, grasses, spices, fruit, wood, roots, resins, balsams, leaves, gums, and animal secretions—as well as resources like alcohol, petrochemicals, coal, and coal tars are used in the manufacture of perfumes.

Some plants, such as lily of the valley, do not produce oils naturally. In fact, only about 2,000 of the 250,000 known flowering plant species contain these essential oils. Therefore, synthetic chemicals must be used to re-create the smells of non-oily substances. Synthetics also create original scents not found in nature.

This gives the modern perfumer a very large arsenal to draw from when he or she wants to create a certain fragrance. They have learned how to use fragrances very well to duplicate or to create certain effects.

Fragrances are normally blended in order to appeal to a certain group of people which serves to make the product more marketable.

Some perfume ingredients are animal products. For example, castor comes from beavers, musk from male deer, and ambergris from the sperm whale. Animal substances are often used as fixatives that enable perfume to evaporate slowly and emit odors longer.

Other fixatives include coal tar, mosses, resins, or synthetic chemicals. Alcohol and sometimes water are used to dilute ingredients in perfumes. It is the ratio of alcohol to scent that determines whether the perfume is "eau de toilette" (toilet water) or cologne.

Sometimes ingredients used to create a fragrance may not have a pleasant fragrance when they are used alone but they will greatly enhance the overall character of the finished product when they are blended into the mixture. Order Scented Body Oils