We're well aware that eyeliners and mascaras have expiration dates... But what about perfume? Believe it or not, your favorite scent has a shelf life -- and it's shorter than you think.
That didn't stop Chanel from making their signature fragrance in what WSJ calls "a Big Gulp-sized bottle," though. Since some people apparently can't get enough of Chanel No. 5, the brand's iconic scent designed by Coco herself, the fragrance now comes in a 30-ounce bottle -- a size you're more likely to see on Costco shelves than atop chic department store beauty counters. That's just shy of two pounds of perfume.
Ringing up for $4,200, eclipsing Chanel's earlier 7.5-ounce No. 5 bottle, sold for $2,100, the new bottle of perfume is certainly an investment. Though WSJ's Big Spender columnist Charles Passy reports that the average consumer goes through "about one ounce per year of a good perfume... the life span after you open it is about 2 to 3 years." Now, we're no mathematicians, but according to our calculations, that means it'd take 30 years to get through a vessel of this size, and the product might expire a tenth of the way through that time.
"This is not really for using," Passy says. "This is a showpiece. This is a $4,200 thing to put on your mantle or on your dresser or wherever you want to put it that says, 'I've got a lot of Chanel.'"
Passy may have a point... But this perfume sure looks and smells pretty. Would you invest in a 30-ounce perfume?
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Other iconic fragrances -- albeit in smaller bottles: