Being a smaller, boutique brand, it’s easy to get lost in the huge fragrance category, especially when you’re up against massive mainstream names. However, we felt that if our idea was true to the outrageous, experimental nature of Etat Libre d’Orange, it would not be hard to create brand awareness and drive trial.

Etat Libre d'Orange is a controversial French fragrance house, whose perfumes are designed as tools of erotic exploration.

Due to its subversive nature, the brand has a niche cult following, and is only available at limited high-end stores. As sales are based on PR, word-of-mouth and in-store trial, our task was to deliver an instore sampling idea that could be used as a promotional tool at special times of the year such as Christmas and Valentine’s Day.

Our solution was a twist on the age-old perfume sampling device, thetester strip. Instead of

shop assistants (or promoters) spraying conventional strips with fragrance, the perfumes are sprayed onto the crotch of pretty panties, which shoppers then get to sniff.

Six pairs of knickers were designed for six of Etat’s naughtiest fragrances, ie. ‘Hotel Slut’: a fragrance based on elicit encounters in hotel rooms, ‘Don’t get me wrong baby, I don’t swallow’: the scent of feigned innocence and fellatio, ‘Magnificent Secretions’: the animalistic scent of desire, ‘Jasmine and Cigarette’: the smell of post-coital satisfaction, ‘Charogne’: a fragrance flirting with Death, and ‘Real Blonde’: is she really blonde? Only one way to check.

As they create quite a stir, footfall increases when the panties are used and conversion performance peaks. Although we’ve had reports of a couple of red-faced customers, our sniffable panties always meet with an overwhelmingly positive response.