Inside Bath & Body Works’ Fragrance Factory
“Japanese Cherry Blossom” has brought in $1.5 billion over the last 20 years. Can the company’s close-knit network of suppliers come up with the next big thing and improve sales?
Credit... Video by Maddie McGarvey and Vincent Tullo
Farah Stockman reported from New York and New Albany, Ohio.
In a brightly lit Manhattan office above a fragrance laboratory, Mary Testa-Gough brought a white strip of paper to her nose and inhaled. Two perfumers’ assistants awaited her verdict, as if the fate of a multibillion-dollar olfactory empire depended on it.
“Smoky,” Ms. Testa-Gough said. “Mossy. Woody. But it feels unfinished.”
As the chief “nose” for Bath & Body Works , Ms. Testa-Gough is in charge of finding the next Japanese Cherry Blossom. That single scent has generated more than $1.5 billion in sales over the last 20 years, filling millions of homes with the aroma of Asian pear, white jasmine and basmati rice.
