I have allergies with asthma and odors/fragrances also trigger my migraines. Are they intended to be 'showing' the fragrances or are they just coming through the packaging? I agree, it's really unnecessary to put the stuff out if they are. Can't do the candleshops either. I don't like to have my personal space bombarded with the stuff even if it didn't make me sick! It comes home with you -- in your hair and clothes. Ewww.

Those lines they give you are really annoying too.

I hate the scented stores too. Pier One gets me for 5 minutes and that's it. If I can't find what I need in 5, I have to get out. I know this is a problem for many, because I'm hearing the complaints from others left and right. I guess scent must sell though, or the big stores would make a change.

My biggest complaint is in my workplace. I wait on customers at a bank. And this time of year, the cold weather enhances scent. And people are shopping so they drench themselves in Obsession, Eternity, and all things Estee Lauder. I reel back in dismay when I have to wait on someone smelly. Usually, I can hold my breath (and talk to see what they need) for about half a minute. But then, I have to step back, go pick up a piece of paper, pretend to need an approval from my manager, Something--Anything--to get away from the scent. And almost never do I say anything to a client. Partly from a desire not to offend them, but also because people don't care. They really don't. When I've had a fit of coughing from some particular fragrance that overwhelms me, they may ask if I have a cold. I've told a few that it's perfume. Do you know what they say??

"Oh, I'm wearing hardly any at all!" "It can't be mine, I can barely smell it myself!" Or my favorite........when they want to ask me questions about my perfume allergy and then MORE questions about their account. "Can you see if my check for $15 has cleared? Yes? Hmmmmmm..... Well, what about the one for $55? Do you see that? No? I went to the gas station today and filled up my car. Is the gasoline on there yet??"
If it were me and I could see that something I'm wearing was causing distress, I would ask to see someone else to answer my extra questions. But most people will go on chattering. So, I usually just try to hold my breath, walk away, breathe in again, and come back. Rarely does anyone even know I have an issue.

Red

No, this wasn't a display of open fragrances, it was just the odors seeping through the flimsy paper packages!

Red- I hear you about Obession and Estee Lauder!! Add to that Donna Karan's "Cashmere", "Shalimar" and Thierry Mugler's "Angel", all of those literally make me nauseous! I made my daughter promise to never buy Cashmere again!

Squirrel- that's probably why I don't shop in Pier One either!

I react to certain scents, especially that perfume that smells like roses. I think it's Tea Rose? Anyway, today in the FedEx office I almost had to leave because some woman was drenched in it.

scents make me feel terible-very sick to my stomach. I have left many stores, told clerks and owners, and even had to tell one friend that we could not longer hug hello. The perfume gets on my clothes and hair and then I have to shower. It took washing and drycleaning a cotton jacket that I had on when she last hugged me and I still pick up the scent when it is warm out. I use only nonscented soaps and lotions and candles. Finding unscented candles has become difficult at times..target is the best of the money, Pier One is now only carrying them seasonally. I spoke with a doc who thinks that people are going to pay someday with allergies and respiratory problems. Her theory is that the companies are mixing things that we really don't know yet what the long term combinations and the effects with be. I just bought my DH some concert tickets for Christmas and after I pushed the "buy" button I actually sat here worrying that I will have to sit next to someone with perfume or cologne on all evening. I wish this fad of perfumes and candles would go away and fresh would mean that the air is neutral.

The fragrance samples that are enclosed in the ads mailed by department stores precipitate my allergies big-time. I've e-mailed them several times but they still keep coming. The ads are usually in a stack of other ads, catalogues and magazines, so I don't see them until I start sneezing and feel my eyes itch.I take them outside but suffer for hours.

Scents give me migraines too. Thank you for complaining. I don't go to BB&B often, thank goodness.

I used to get a bill from a locally owned department store. I called to complain about the scented perfume ads it contained and she put on the the list to receive the non-scented bills. Who would have thought they had such a thing?

Magazines - cannot stand the ones with scented perfume ads.

Macy's mail outs contain them too. *eyes rolling*

My sister KNOWS perfume gives me migraines - she'll still get in the car with it on, so I've stopped going anywhere with her. :D Seriously. She says "but I didn't put much on!" Hello!? It is better if it's not TONS but it still matters if it's ANY at all!

Okay, my BP is up but I'm feeling better. :D

I had to laugh when I saw this. I was standing in line at the post office the other day and the woman in front of me had on some awful (to me anyway) fragrance and way too much. I couldn't catch my breath and suppose I was looking green because the gentleman behind me asked "are you OK?" I told him yes, I just can't breathe with that woman's perfume. He laughed!! I love scents, but light fragrances or otherwise I can't breath, and start coughing.

I, too, have difficulty with heavy scents in stores, so I tend to avoid those stores. And perfume is also a problem, although I don't have problem with all perfumes, just one that is very popular. I don't know what it is, but I know it every time I encounter it and it is just wretched!!!!! And it seems that the users always use way too much, or use it in multiple forms to compound the 'effect' I guess, so I don't know what it is about that particular perfume. It's a very popular one, but it makes me absolutely nauseous. I've had the same problem with being hugged by someone wearing it and it clings FOREVER! And one time a woman who was wearing it was in our house here for about 20 minutes and it lingered in here for DAYS!!!! I have just one perfume that I like and use, and I apply just a very tiny bit on some special occasions, but forego it when I know I'll be sitting in an audience, such as a concert or movie.

Last night I was at the grocery store and the woman at the checkout was wearing Obsession....couldn't really get away from her but fortunately was just picking up a few things.

Shopping esp this time of year can be a real challenge...nothing like a migraine on top of stressful holiday shopping!

I am also sensitive to the off-gassing in electronics stores.

I have similar strategies in the aforementioned stores...pretty much in and out.

DOn't get me started on those plug-in air fresheners!

Strangely the natural scents of Xmas such as pine trees, don't seem to bother my allergies...just those nasty artificial ones.

I refuse to go in a store that sells fragrances, colognes, candles. When I was younger, no problem. Then in my adult life, I got migraines and now that I am older that has turned to asthma and I refuse to go through the department that sells them. I will NEVER go in Kirkland's again, Pier One, and I rarely go to Dillard's but when I do, I enter from the back so I don't have to go through the stink. I have quit going to church because of cologne. I cannot breathe. Why should I go to these places just to make myself seriously ill? I just refuse to do it. I am hoping there will be a time that fragrances can be outlawed in the work place, churches, etc.

I love home scents, candles etc... but the perfumes that some people wear are sometimes unbearable, specially at a restaurant............

I feel for all of you above that are highly intolerant, which I'm not, it will make me cringe but not ill.

I hate overly loud music in some stores, it's as if they are trying to make you go home.

A number of years ago I worked a brief stint in a craft mall. The scented crap in there was so overpowering, and after a day walking the aisles, I'd leave with a migraine so vicious that I was vomiting by the time I got home. I quit the job.

I like certain scents, but most definitely not if they're overpowering. I work with a delightful woman who, unfortunately, drenches herself in a perfume that causes me to sneeze violently whenever I'm in close proximity to her. I'm **this close** to asking her to tone it down, but if/when I do, I know she'll be mortified at the thought of offending anyone with her scent. I'm sure she has no clue.

The one that annoys me this time of year are those bags of cinnamon pinecones.

I went into JoAnn's Fabric's last night and literally the second I entered the cinnamon pine cone smell overpowered me. It was so overwhelming that within two minutes of being in the store I just said forget it. Nothing in here I need badly enough to endure this crappy smell. I took 30 second on my way out to express that to the manager on duty who frankly could have cared less.

I'm most sincerely sorry for all of you, but glad to see I'm not the only one "dealing" here.

The weird thing to me is this.......I've owned and worn, White Shoulders, 3 or 4 of the Estee Lauders, and so many other perfumes through the years. I wouldn't buy unscented deodorant or shampoo or anything else, because I loved the scent so much. In a job I held in my late 20's, I did some cocktail waitressing for the hotel, both in the bar and in banquet rooms, and even though I have never been a smoker, the smell of it didn't really bother me. Now, when I have a client who smells like an ashtray, I'm dying. And the perfumes that I used to love to wear myself, are the worst offenders!

I feel so much guilt for all the mean things I've muttered under my breath about women who've told me, "Oh, I can't sit there, I'm allergic to perfumes..." I Totally thought they just wanted to draw attention to themselves with their 'allergies'.
Sometimes I do O.K. and sometimes the migraines come on gangbusters. Some people make me nauseous, and some close up my throat and cause severe pain in my chest that lingers for hours. Some stuff causes a little throat-clearing cough, and some causes my eyes to water, my cough to disable me, and I feel faint.

And I still don't get why people are so opposed to knocking it down a notch. One elderly lady (84) that I'm friends with, told me that someone had told her they were allergic to her (heavy) perfume, and to please not wear it to religious meetings. (Not me. I'd be scared to tell her Anything!!) She told me they were out of their minds. She said "Perfume is my Obsession! I'm not going to stop wearing it for Anyone!"

Red

I sure hope some of the retailers are reading this. The smell of eucalyptus, memory foam, eucalyptus, plastic shoes, and did I mention eucalyptus?, goes right up to the top of my list.

There's nothing worse than being stuck in a car, office, or any other small enclosed space with someone drenched in perfume. This is a case of "a little goes a long way" and it would be nice if other folks realized that not everyone enjoys these expensive smells the way the wearer does.

If someone insists on wearing scent, a lotion is usually much less offensive than a perfume or cologne.

Based upon the elderly woman's attitude, she might not even have very many "anyones" to stop doing anything for! ;-)

There are a lot of people now who can't handle artificial scents. In fact, several of my younger (autistic spectrum) son's schools and therapy clinics had signs prominently displayed asking parents, staff and visitors not to wear perfumes, colognes or scented products at the school, and that, if they were wearing them, to please ask the staff at the front desk to fetch the child or run whatever errand needed running. Some of the kids were that adversely affected...

Myself, most scents designed for women really irritate me; but I love many scents designed for men. My husband has exactly the reverse pattern, and loves the women's scents and doesn't care much for the men's. Gotta be something gender-related here... We have a tough time finding scents to wear that we can standand that appeal to each other.

It's interesting, I used to be a fragrance *hound*. I have lots of expensive fragrances upstairs, but I can't use them anymore! Cartier Declaration (a man's fragrance), Fracas, what else--those two stand out in my memory as my favorites--I went through a Clinique Aromatics Elixir period...but my tolerance, simple physical tolerance, has dropped to the point I almost physically recoil when the doors open at BB&B, for instance.

Something has changed in my physiology making me much more sensitive, which I'm sorry about, because fragrances used to give me great pleasure. There's even a book by Dianne Ackerman about how fragrances are one of the most powerful, visceral senses (called _A Natural History of the Senses_) that I bought right when it came out because I was *so* into fragrance I wanted to learn about it as much as I could. I feel sometimes like Julianne Moore's character in "Safe" who can't take any of contemporary toxins floating our way in so many different ways, e.g. truck exhaust coming through our car vents...are we all becoming more environmentally sensitive and so we can't even enjoy decent fragrances anymore?

I know alot of folks loose their sense of smell as they get older, so perhaps drowning in Obsession is the only way that little old lady can tell she's even wearing it? Then again, if she hadn't OD'd on it for years and years, perhaps her olfactory nerves would still be functioning properly, and she wouldn't need to surround herself in clouds of toxic fumes. IMHO, if you need more than a dab on your wrist, and behind your knees(*), then you probably need a bath first. Estee Lauder is not a cover scent for BO. But then, if it doesn't cost money, it means you can't show off how affluent you are if you go around just smelling like a regular *person*.

Once we have finished outlawing smoking, I wonder if they'll go after fragrances with "Fragrance Free" zones in resturants, hotel rooms, hospital waiting rooms. Imagine, no perfume in Federal Buildings, or on any public transportation, especially airplaines; you'll have to pass by the Canine Cologne Corps to board. If the Beagle sneezes, you just missed your flight. ("Ma'am, can you please step over here, I'm afraid we're going to have to give you a mandatory hosing off before we can let you fly. Yes Ma'am, I realize you will probably miss your connection in Denver, but you REEK. They had to use the inhaler on poor old Sparky.") And of course, Washington will budgest gobs of money to the Police to start up a N.O.S.E. campaign; No Offensive Smells, Ever, complete with cartoonish pamphlets, bumper stickers, and clear plastic ribbons to remind everyone that the only good smell is no smell at all. All the schools will have NOSE week, some smart@ss seniors will try to come to class wearing only saran wrap, and the festivities willculminate on Friday with the entire school taking part in a Pep Ralley and poking 100's of styrofoam cups through the chain link fence to proclaim "Stink Free And Proud"!

(*)okay, maybe a tiny dab between your breasts, assuming anyone else might be there later to appreciate it. ;^)

I don't think it has anything to do with "we are becoming environmentally ..." My grandmother had asthma and she could not allow anyone in her home with cologne because of that. She died of asthma and had suffered from it all her life, without any smokers in her home or her friends. Some people just have asthma and most people do not care enough to keep their homes and bodies clean and the stench of cologne and candles at a minimum. There is nothing more alluring to an animal whose instincts are right on than another of the opposite sex that is in good health and well, but I doubt any cologne would attract a member of the opposite sex. We can buy into that marketing all we want to but the truth is nothing is as alluring as confidence, a sense of humor and cleanliness.

Left this off...
"Estee Lauder is not a cover scent for BO. But then, if it doesn't cost money, it means you can't show off how affluent you are if you go around just smelling like a regular *person*. They don't call 'em the "Great Unwashed" for nothin' ya know. ;^)

Gee, I didn't know all this time I was wearing perfume to "show off how affluent I am"--I thought I was wearing it because I enjoyed the fragrance myself.

That being said, there are many days I'm not in the mood to wear a fragrance. I have several friends who are allergic and just do not like fragrance so I naturally abstain from wearing any around them--I also can't give them candles and such as gifts.

Some stores are overpowering with scents, and noises--for that matter--loud, irritating music gets on my nerves. There is plenty of competition so I take my business elsewhere when it bothers me.

Funny, my mother used to wear that horrible Estee Lauder Youthdew, and now she can't stand any fragrances-even hairspray makes her sick. I have walked into stores, and walked right back out because of overpowering scents. I developed an aversion to perfume when I had severe morning sickness with 3 pregnancies.

A friend of mine sends all those perfumed ads and other ads right back to the companies with her bill payments. Send all of that crap right back where it came from!

...I doubt any cologne would attract a member of the opposite sex. We can buy into that marketing all we want to but the truth is nothing is as alluring as confidence, a sense of humor and cleanliness.

Ooh, I can remember a number of "encounters" where a man's cologne was quite the aphrodisiac. There were other factors too, but in the heat of the moment that was a major player.

I'm so glad to see that I'm not the only one who can't tolerate both overly scented stores and people. It is so annoying as well as affecting my asthma. I prefer the natural smell of clean spaces and people - no need to cover up smells if they aren't there in the first place.

And it isn't just elderly women and those women who work the perfume counters who reek: it's women and men of all ages who may overindulge.

I did once like a clean, light fragrance and hardly used any at all. The amount of stuff that comes out of a spray or multiple dabs is amazing and I can never understand how people can put that much on, esp relative to how much I seemed to get out of applying hardly a touch of the stuff.

What really smells bad is when it is used as a masking fragrance.

Around here, the trend seems to have taken to people not wearing fragrance (not stores though). For some time, I think (although I could be totally mistaken). I really don't like it, though, when someone has to deliberately make a public and dramatic 'statement' when an perfumed individual is in the area. I know a couple of people who do that and think it is embarassingly poor manners and quite unkind.

When I used to shop the mall there would be women in the department stores spraying people on the way out! How obnoxious is that! I wonder if they still do it.

I have always had a hard time with fragrance, but I've always been a smelly person. For years I wore peppermint oil, but it bothered my skin eventually.

I have headaches all the time now and perfume is not a pleasant experience. I've had asthma and skin reactions on and off over the years. I can tolerate experiencing that every now and then for GOOD smells, but when I'm just being assaulted with farshtunkeneh, I'm sorry... no good.

I too have asthma and allergies. A lot of scents give me migrains as well. While shopping with my sister in law at the mall the other day for my 22 year old nephew, we went in to Hollister to get him a hoodie. Well, beside the music being so loud that I literally couldn't talk to her 2 feet in front of me, the stench of whatever cologne or perfume they were selling was so bad I had to leave. It overpowered the store and was stuck to my clothes after I left.

Besides the fact that the god-awful looking hoodie was over $100 (looked like a dead animal in the fake fur-lined hood), I would never go in there again between the music and the smell. My 5 year-old even couldn't stand it.

"Gee, I didn't know all this time I was wearing perfume to "show off how affluent I am"

Demifloyd, that was said with tongue firmly planted in cheek, see second part of comment that got left off. FWIW, I don't think ALL women who wear perfume are trying to show how "affluent" they are, only the ones who practically bathe in it. Then again, they're being told by "industry leaders" like Grand-daughter Lauder, whose first name escapes me just now, (but the last (last!) issue of House & Garden had her on the cover.) says you should spray perfume "everywhere", your body, your clothes, even on your hairbrush before you brush your hair. Now, do you think that's really necessary to simply "enjoy a fragrance", or is it just a way to get gullible women to use up their $60.00 bottle of Knowing a little faster? Thoseare the gals I'm talking about, sorry if I have offended you.

Oh, and just so there's no misunderstanding, I'm not advocating federal funding for NOSE week either; that was only a bit of fun. Perhaps I should consider the liberal addition of more smileys? :^)

It takes a lot more than that to offend me, littledog. (smiley face here). I think you are referring to Aerin Lauder, perhaps?

I actually agree that when a fragrance is noticed before the woman is noticed, something is not right. I prefer very light scents--the kind when people are very close to you and remark, "you smell so good." But they don't ask what you are wearing because they think it is natural.

I had to come back and tell you that I received an email from Bed, Bath and Beyond promising feedback within 24-48 hours that came in on Sunday. DH saw it and told me tonight. Meanwhile, this afternoon I received a call from a district manager following up on my online comments about the scent wars in their stores.
I was so impressed with their response and their attitude! She visited their superstore today and completely agreed with my complaint. Furthermore, she instructed the manager to not concentrate all the scents in that one area. She felt that the discomfort was related to the overkill at every corner of the bedding dept. She admitted being distressed that a customer or an employee should feel ill due to the scents. She shared that they do sell quite a bit, so someone is buying this stuff, but they would mix it up a bit more to distribute it better.
As to the scented pinecones, she called that store's district mgr, but told me that corporate is test marketing in some stores with a change in packaging. Test stores have the pinecones in a plastic, sealed bag and not in a mesh one, thereby reducing the odor. She felt confident that next year's cones would ALL be packaged that way.

There you have it, a company who CARES!! How refreshing is that?!!

Yes it is! Go BBB and the DM! Mesh? Yikes. Maybe they're getting quite a few complaints. Sometimes it helps :)

Good job!

Wow, that is a refreshing stance, especially for such a large company. Another one here sensitive to perfumes (didn't used to be that way, hit me in my late 20's or so). It seems to be easing up in recent years, but there was a time I couldn't walk down the detergent aisle in the grocery store without getting a migraine.

Made me start thinking of how it almost seems pointless sometimes to wear a specific fragrance. Don't get me wrong, not bashing perfume because when I could wear it I loved a dab or two ;). Personally I use strictly fragrance free everything, unless it's a product like a shampoo scented strictly with herbs and nature's oils, those don't seem to bother me so much. But when I first started searching for (sometimes difficult to find) fragrance free detergent/soap/antiperspirant/lotions it made me realize how our world is saturated in perfumes. Think about the 'layers' of fragrance: clothing from laundry products, soaps from bathing, shampoo, conditioner, lotion, hair styling products. One day I was thinking it just seems like a waste to even put perfume on because it's a battlefield of underlying scents.

I can relate to so many of these comments. I feel too, that we are bombarded by fragrance now, and I don't know if I changed or the industry changed - but after 1985 I stopped wearing all perfumes. Before that, I was one of those offenders, wearing Shalimar, Chanel 19, Givenchy, went crazy over them. That was the year was pregnant and had my son so maybe my body changed during that time and never went back.

Now, so many things bother me!! Stores filled with candles, eucalyptus, incense, room fresheners, people drenched in cologne, cars with cardboard pine cones hanging from the rearview mirror, or scented with artificial strawberry (that one has to be the worst) - even on the beach this summer, I had to move to a different spot because the person 30 feet away from me had some kind of artificial coconut sun tan lotion on that just reeked. I even have to avoid the aisle in the supermarket where the artifically buttered microwave popcorn lurks. All I can smell is "rancid." LOL. It's banned at home as well - unless I'm out of the house, the kids cannot make it! I'm not allergic in the true sense of the word but get an immediate sinus headache from all these things.

I don't use fabric softener or any detergent with scent. It's amazing too, how nice and "crisp" clothes feel when they haven't been "softened" (i.e. covered with a layer of grease). We have a blended family and when my son comes home from his dad's house,and my stepdaughters come back from their mom's, I can smell the Bounce sheets a mile away. That reminds me. We bought a vacation home last year and the previous owner must have read one of those Household Hint columns. There were individual Bounce sheets in every drawer, every cupboard, behind furniture and even under carpets. I'm still looking for them every time I go up there.

And I'm sure that on some level, even by my family, I am viewed as a "fussy" person, so I hate making a big deal of it. I know people are tired of hearing me protest. But even chenille sweaters bug me -- blocked sinuses, itchy eyes. So added to all those "oh no, Hon, what's that new smell on you?" comments, my husband has to try to not wear the nice gifts he got from his daughters.

LOL, yesterday my son came home with a bag of hazelnut flavoured coffee. I started to rant. Everyone else loves it, and all I can think about is a sandwich place I used to go to at lunch time, where the tuna, roast beef and egg salad sandwiches all tasted like hazelnut coffee because they had a pot of it brewing in there all the time. Revolting!

That's my rant over. Thank you for allowing me to express this. It needed to come out! lol

Pam

My mother just left. I had to stand across the room from her while we visited. She KNOWS perfumes, heavy smells, etc give me headaches. This is the only time I ever remember her wearing something so strong - backs up the older you get, the less you can smell it yourself so the more you put on theory! lol

She finally asked why I was backing away from her, so I told her she had on too much perfume. She said something like "I thought it smelled good. *eyes rolling*

lol, oh allison, I know it's not funny, but I just had a mental flash of you being backed into a corner by your mom, strategically dodging and weaving with her every move to keep an equal distance between you. ;)

I've read that before, that using the same fragrance over and over does 'desensitize' one to it. I'll never forget the woman in the executive office building I used to work in. My department was near the ladies lounge, she worked on the same floor but clear on the other side of the building. I could always tell when she had come or gone from the lounge because there was literally a trail of perfume left lingering in the corridors long after she had passed by. (And this was an open concept building, with cubicles dividing offices, not solid walls.) Yikes!

pam, your post re: bounce reminded me, my sister and I have always traded clothing, bailed each other out when in a pinch for an 'occasion', give each other sweaters, etc that the other one tires of. She loves fragrance softener with a heavy mountain scent. It takes 4 wash cycles with an extra rinse on each one to get the mountain scent out of clothing. I counted ;-)

LOL, moonshadow!! How crazy is that in itself, even - Mountain Scent.. Glad there isn't a mountain behind my house!