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Guest: Josh Smith, founder of Libertine Fragrance.
Host: Kevin Mako, founder of Product Startup and the leading expert in hardware startup consulting. A hardware entrepreneur since 1999, Kevin has advised more than 1,500 founders and built and scaled MAKO Invent through its acquisition by TriMech in 2024.
Starting Small in an Unfamiliar Product Category
Josh Smith shares how he entered fragrance without industry experience and started Libertine Fragrance with about $500. He explains how studying other brands, narrowing infinite product possibilities, educating customers, and learning by doing helped him build a distinctive niche business.
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Filip Valica: Hey, everyone. Welcome to the Product Startup Podcast, a podcast that helps bring your product idea to life by chatting with successful inventors, product designers, and other industry professionals. This podcast is run by Mako
Filip Valica: Design + Invent and hosted by Filip Valica. Our goal here is to get to the bottom of what makes a product successful, from initial idea to putting your product on the shelf. We're taking you step by step to build a functional product and scale your product business. Now onto the show.
Filip Valica: The product startup, episode 30. Today I'm joined by Josh Smith. He's a first-time designer, turned perfumer. So in the last year of his industrial design degree, he started Libertine Fragrance to learn about the side of product development that his degree didn't teach him. And he's been
Filip Valica: growing his business ever since. Welcome to the product startup podcast, helping you turn ideas into successful products step by step with your host,
Filip Valica: Filip Valica. Hi, everyone. Thank you for joining me. In the last episode, we talked with Adam Force. He's the founder of change creator, a digital magazine and premium resource for social entrepreneurship. We talked about this tug-of-war relationship
Filip Valica: between pure capitalism and social responsibility and how we can make a lasting change in the world through our own business. We also talked about some of the businesses that he started that
Filip Valica: failed, so make sure to tune in to episode 29 if you want to hear more about that. So what do you think about the podcast so far? Just like any other small business owner, I'm looking to you for
Filip Valica: feedback to make sure that you who's paid with your time are getting value for the show. So what can I change to make it even better for you? What should I not touch? Don't hesitate.
Filip Valica: Shoot me an email at Philip at the product startup.com or go to the product startup.com and hit Ask Philip and let me know. So let's get started. Hi Josh. Thanks for coming on the show today. Hey there. Thanks for having me. So you have a really interesting story.
Josh Smith: Can you dig into a little bit of that? I took Forestry out of high school as a career path. and halfway through my education with that, I kind of realized as much as I love sort of being outside and the forest, the trees, and everything, really interested in all the city has to
Josh Smith: offer, not a small town guy. So after a few years, I turned to design and just finished up my industrial design degree here in Alberta. Towards the end of that degree, I ended up just kind of
Josh Smith: loosely looking at perfumes and things. I've always sort of been interested in essential oils and had had a few kicking around the house. During the sort of finality of my design degree, we held a pop-up shop, just sort of all the design students, to really give people an idea of what it's like
Josh Smith: to create a product and get it all the way, you know, have real people purchasing it. I wanted to practice branding a little bit more and then perfume's a great product because it's sort of an invisible product. So it's all about how you kind of market it and brand it.
Josh Smith: And the pop-up shop did really well. So just sort of decided to keep on with it and it's
Filip Valica: been growing for since. That's really interesting. I mean, what did you know about fragrances before you started getting into them? I know you mentioned that you knew a little bit about essential oils, but did you just go on the internet? and kind of read some things about it
Josh Smith: and order a kid online and start mixing? Yeah, absolutely.
Josh Smith: It's, I mean, yeah, the, along with, you know, a lot of other things these days, there's a decent, a small but, you know, very active blogging community about, you know, interested in perfumes or the creation of perfumes. So there is a lot of, if you hunt,
Josh Smith: there's a lot of information about that sort of stuff and just really got a, at a summer job that had a lot of downtime. So reading a lot of blogs,
Josh Smith: um go home and uh order some ingredients and play around and and that grew and i was doing that
Filip Valica: for for about a year kind of practicing um and and then that the pop-up shop came and i thought that was my chance to at least try it on a small scale that's really exciting especially because you're like you said you're able to test it and see if there's any demand for it if you're good at
Filip Valica: it and in a way i'm sure there was probably a lot of pressure on you because this was one of your
Josh Smith: final projects but at the same time at least it wasn't your livelihood was uh dependent on it yeah Yeah, absolutely. This whole thing,
Josh Smith: I've really viewed it as, I think it's maybe a little bit different from a lot of people starting with new companies or starting projects because I wasn't really relying on it at all.
Josh Smith: And there's a lot of freedom, you know, being in school or just doing something on the side like that. And that's been kind of my ethos for this whole project is taking it
Filip Valica: in small steps and learning new things and growing and kind of building on that. Yeah, that sounds really fun. And you're able to kind of explore the things that were interesting to you. Along the way, did you run into any stumble? as you were kind of exploring where you thought,
Josh Smith: man, I don't know if this is right for me, or did you kind of keep a pretty rigid focus on the end goal? I mean, I guess it's been pretty rigid.
Josh Smith: And for the end goal, it was, I mean, it started as basically, you know, just trying to, trying to gather what I can from, you know, the sort of business side and the side that design school doesn't necessarily teach you about getting products in the world.
Josh Smith: So it's always been, I mean, the end goal, part of the end goal for me has been continued education.
Josh Smith: But I mean, yeah, there has been, you know, there's a lot of regulation in the industry,
Josh Smith: especially as you kind of expand and start selling elsewhere in the country or in the world.
Josh Smith: And, you know, along with all sorts of business, the kind of legal side of things can
Filip Valica: really get a guy down if he doesn't know kind of what to look for. So that's probably been the hardest thing is finding out that information. Yeah, so maybe you can expand on that a little bit. I know when it comes to maybe the analog would be cooking, you can.
Filip Valica: can cook out of your kitchen until you hit a certain size and then you need a local permit
Josh Smith: here in the States to cook legally or to prepare food for sale. How does that work with fragrances?
Josh Smith: So with fragrances and it's,
Josh Smith: yeah, cooking is a pretty decent analogy for a lot of the things. But fragrances and other cosmetics, there's definitely you can do it to a reasonable scale actually, which I haven't hit yet where I've had to find.
Josh Smith: alternative space. I'm still working from my own space, able to do this. But there is some requirements in terms of just sort of best practices for, you know, disinfecting things and having
Josh Smith: everything, you know, ensuring that it's sort of a safe space you're working in. Right.
Filip Valica: Yeah, more of the regulations I've come up against are actually sort of ingredients that can be put in at certain concentrations.
Filip Valica: Yeah, just, I guess, what can go into those things.
Filip Valica: different cosmetics and perfumes. That makes sense. So did you have to submit paperwork to any
Josh Smith: type of regulatory body to get a certification or to get approval or to get a license? Or is it just like you were saying, focusing on the materials that you're putting in and making sure that they've been tested before and they're safe?
Josh Smith: Basically,
Josh Smith: in North America, it's actually, it's pretty wide open. It's pretty easy to get going with small scale cosmetics. There are some certifications that you have to get in Canada. Anyway,
Josh Smith: so I did have to submit sort of an ingredients list, and they can come back and ask for further tests and whatnot.
Josh Smith: But the real, I guess, certifying body is actually in Europe, and it's the IFRA, the International Fragrance Regulatory Association, I believe, is the acronym.
Josh Smith: And they're quite strict and quite thorough with what can go in at certain concentrations. and Europe being kind of the, this, you know, perfume world sort of center.
Josh Smith: It's, most of the standards, you know, that's basically kind of the, just the letter of the law. That's what you should try to follow.
Josh Smith: So a lot of, it's basically been, you can sell in North America fairly easily and the restrictions are a lot lighter.
Filip Valica: But if you have any intention on going to Europe, which, you know, hopefully,
Josh Smith: yeah, I'd love access to that marketplace. So it's starting to follow and have basically formulated my my perfumes around what their standard is. That's where I was getting at as if you had an end goal in mind.
Josh Smith: Did you change your approach the way that you were building your products?
Josh Smith: Yeah, absolutely.
Josh Smith: And I mean, just learning, learning sort of more about individual ingredients to go into things. There's a lot of things.
Josh Smith: Like, they have a list of certain ingredients that, you know, you have, it can be up to a certain percentage in a finished product and then they have certain things
Filip Valica: where if it's that they consider an allergen so it can cause a slight skin irritation in a certain number of people so you have to list that you know this could contain those those ingredients
Filip Valica: so just making sure is you know that's just kind of packaging restriction so if you if you make
Josh Smith: you know your package for what European standard is then you're pretty much good around the world yep makes sense yeah we do that in engineering all the time there's multiple regular buddies that it kind of intersect each other. And if you just pick the strictest one, you could cover your basis for all the markets.
Josh Smith: Yeah, absolutely. Might drive your costs up higher for your local market as well.
Filip Valica: Well, and then also, along with that, there's to get in kind of officially into Europe, there's definitely testing.
Josh Smith: There's quite a bit more testing there. So that's, you know, the first hurdle kind of conquered. But then, yeah, to get to get over there and be officially set up, there's definitely a lot more, kind of dealing with that regulatory association.
Josh Smith: Yeah, you know, in a more in-depth way. Sure. Well, in a way, by starting up this way, the market is paying your way into Europe. I mean, would you say that's right? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I,
Josh Smith: especially always a final year university student. So kind of cash strapped.
Filip Valica: But I think my initial investment was about $500 that I was just like, okay, I'm going to do this. I'm going to try. And that's basically just been paying back.
Filip Valica: everything. I've had no outside investments as of this point and just kind of just hustling for that next bit of income and then reallocating that. Right. Yeah, bootstrapping it and just growing the business from itself. Yeah, yeah, totally.
Filip Valica: That's pretty amazing. I love hearing stories about people getting started for relatively small amounts of money. One of the top questions that I get offline is, I don't have enough money to get my product out there. I need a rich investor to fund me. And you're definitely on the other
Josh Smith: other side of the camp where you're able to prove that, you know, it's possible to do it on your own. Yeah, absolutely. So when you bought some of these ingredients and you started experimenting,
Josh Smith: tell me how that worked out for you. Like, did you have a test group where you asked people their opinion on what they preferred or what they liked or how did you create a product line from just all these almost infinite possibilities? Yeah, I mean, I guess,
Josh Smith: truthfully, some of it, especially along with sort of setting this up with the goal of having a business that's sustaining itself, it's definitely also, there's, you know, that kind of artisan aspect
Josh Smith: to it, where it is, you know, me at the kind of control boards creating and it's my main input that goes into it. But I was doing, so I guess personal taste would have been
Josh Smith: kind of a defining feature first,
Josh Smith: making things that I enjoyed and I thought that I would and then following that, looking at a lot of, I guess,
Josh Smith: sort of what's been done in the canon of perfume and what, you know, certain ingredients or certain types of perfumes and certain categories, just seeing sort of what pair as well and breaking down other successes
Josh Smith: a little bit. And then for final testing and sort of that, I mean, it's especially bootstrapping
Filip Valica: it there's it's hard to it's hard to get people to be really truthful about about a product but um luckily design uh is a very uh it's a discipline really open to critique so um i was surrounded by other
Filip Valica: students which you know that age group was it's on the younger side but still while within it's within my um kind of target target market so i would um i set up a a little station at school a couple
Josh Smith: times and just got anonymous feedback that way that's awesome yeah so that's really interesting anonymous feedback. So how did you structure that to where you felt like you were, like you said,
Josh Smith: you were getting feedback that wasn't biased because obviously the school is probably smaller or at least your program might be tight-knit. There's people that know you. They don't want to hurt your feelings or they don't want to seem like they're mean-spirited. How did you make sure
Josh Smith: that they were giving you valuable feedback that wasn't skewed? I mean, I guess that's something that that's really sort of driven home through instructors. You know, that you should, honest feedback is important.
Josh Smith: So it's something, I think, within most design schools that should be fostered.
Josh Smith: And, I mean, just basically trying to take everything else with a bit of a grain of salt. Most, you know, there was a lot of people who would have gone through that definitely would have known that it was, that it was me. But I think even just having that distance, we're not asking the person directly.
Filip Valica: And also, I guess, balancing that information with, and I do a lot of sales, kind of interacting, you know, set up at certain fairs or trade show type things and selling face to face.
Filip Valica: And, I mean, I think there you get the very similar thing where people aren't going to, no one's going to tell you, but they don't like it or it's rare.
Filip Valica: But so just trying to read body language in that way and really just, I guess, balancing out everything that you're reading and hearing and seeing.
Josh Smith: Yeah, managing your outliers and seeing if the trends are everyone kind of likes this or everyone maybe doesn't as much. Yeah, absolutely. Another slice of this that's kind of unique is that your fragrances are unisex.
Josh Smith: And so when you're asking people to test it, I wonder what their expectations are and how that plays into your product. As a man, I might expect a certain type of cologne to smell a certain way. But do you feel like that played a part at all?
Josh Smith: or, I mean, you might be surrounded by a ton of open-minded people that are happy to try on anything. I mean, yeah, I guess that's been sort of, in some ways, it's been a bit of a challenge
Josh Smith: educating a few people, like a smaller segment of the population. And I mean, it's really,
Josh Smith: that was one of the kind of value points that I wanted to add in from the start. And it's sort of embedded in how I even make the perfume. So there's a lot of sort of blending of what would be maybe seen as traditionally masculine,
Josh Smith: kind of woodsy musky notes and the more like softer floral side and trying to combine those and marry those together.
Josh Smith: But when I do unisex or say that, you know, I see I have been typically making it more towards the masculine side because I found through some of that
Josh Smith: research, a lot of a lot of women very openly.
Filip Valica: say they either wear men's clone and really like it, they like that kind of spiciness or that it's a little more robust, a little less sweet.
Filip Valica: Or some would, you know,
Filip Valica: kind of admit to liking it, but we're not sure if they could pull it off. But it's a lot harder, it has been a lot harder to convince kind of men of the more like floral sides.
Filip Valica: So that's been my method of trying to make them most palatable to kind of both, both genders is skew it slightly towards the kind of woodsyer, spicier notes.
Josh Smith: Yeah, and it takes you back to your roots. Yeah, exactly, yeah. Yeah, and then there's that experience there too. No, that's fascinating. So, and I'm going to take one more step back, as you were doing some of this research to see what's out there in the market,
Josh Smith: and you're looking to see where there was a spot for you. What was your thought process in terms of creating the line? You knew that you could manufacture something that was popular just based on maybe
Josh Smith: some of the same ingredients and in terms of some of the same notes that are in other perfumes or were you looking to find a hole and kind of fill that gap and
Josh Smith: say hey there's this this segment of the market here that's underserved and I think that that I can hit that I guess I mean as I have been sort of
Filip Valica: learning the process as well and kind of learning the art of of creating them it was definitely more emulating
Josh Smith: more traditional perfume families and looking at what different houses, different perfume houses or companies sort of carry in terms of, like there's a few different kind of main
Josh Smith: types of fragrances and sort of breaking down those and challenging myself to see like what I could do to come up with something unique and something that I think would be exciting
Josh Smith: for people. I would say if I was, if I'd gone to a manufacturer or some sort of contract Blender and we're telling them, you know, hey, I want, I want to start a perfume, you know,
Josh Smith: company. It definitely would have had to have been more along the research lines looking at certain holes to fill. It's a little bit more of a gamble that way. And what do you say that? Is it just because that they're used to speaking in a certain language or maybe you'd
Filip Valica: have to create a larger buy? Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, just the time that it takes in development,
Filip Valica: as far as I understand, companies are fairly efficient in trying to produce something that of quality, but you are still, you know, scent is a pretty ethereal. It's kind of difficult to describe. So you're going to a company saying, I want to,
Filip Valica: you know, for you to create me a perfume based on whatever story it is that you want to tell or however your branding works,
Josh Smith: but it's a pretty big, I guess, gamble in terms of, am I with the right company? The price is definitely quite a bit, you know, higher than when I do it myself.
Josh Smith: And then, yeah, and then you're in it for a pretty big order once they've spent all that time in research and development. So it's definitely a little bit less agile. You're talking about research and development since it's a
Josh Smith: smells are a little harder to describe. I imagine that there's still the fragrances are built of certain building blocks, right? I mean, I look at it like maybe alchemy and I'm coming in as an outsider. Fragrances work differently on different people, differently on body temperature,
Josh Smith: on their heat activated, they smell differently in various situations. How do you, you create a formula for a fragrance? Is it based off of building blocks or is it just really chemistry?
Josh Smith: Yeah, definitely off of building blocks. I think most people that, I think there's
Filip Valica: a growing number of people taking this up as either a kind of a, you know, large hobby or, you know, as a business as I have. But kind of in the more traditional world, like the kind of classically
Josh Smith: trained perfumers, it would definitely be, they would definitely have a lot more chemistry knowledge than I have. So you get a bit more, a bit more knowledge off the bat of kind of how something is going to act in the end, whereas I definitely have to play around with, I think,
Josh Smith: whereas it was one of those people could maybe intuitively know or come up with a formula, you know, just in their own head. I definitely have to play around and do a lot more tests,
Josh Smith: kind of with actual ingredients, just to see actually how the, you know, how it acts on on skin and how, you know, the different formulation or different building blocks kind of come
Filip Valica: together. So a little bit more playing around, but that's kind of the part that I enjoy anyway, so so how many ingredients are we talking about, are we talking about dozens or hundreds or like,
Josh Smith: do you have a wall of these little glass vials where you take like a drop of one and two drops of another and you kind of blend it together? Yeah, absolutely. It's a, it's a sort of a custom-made
Josh Smith: bookshelf so I can hide it away because it is in my house. But yeah, there's a lot of a lot of little vials of stuff and always more coming it sort of seems like um but yeah i would
Josh Smith: say for depending on on which which one it ranges between um probably about 30 to 70 different
Filip Valica: ingredients in each one geez yeah some of them can be ordered so you have sort of bases pre mixed or um so you get a you know a few a little bit of the labor taken care of but um yeah there's quite a bit going into each thing to have to have to
Josh Smith: describe that to a contract manufacturer, would you describe it in terms of how many parts to a million of one versus another, or by molecular weight?
Josh Smith: It's basically just by, I do everything in grams, so just really, really detail, really accurate scale.
Josh Smith: And I actually just recently got in contact with a contract manufacturer to maybe start outsourcing some of the more popular ones. and seeing what that process is going to be like in terms of them taking it
Filip Valica: and seeing if they can recreate it and then ordering all the ingredients in
Josh Smith: and manufacturing that part for me. That sounds pretty exciting too. Yeah, absolutely.
Filip Valica: Just going through that next stage. So did you always have a really fine sense of smell or how did you hone that to get into this market? Because I imagine that the more you use it, the more precise it might be
Josh Smith: or the more different hints of sense you can pick up. How did that work for you? Yeah, absolutely. I wouldn't say that I had an exceptional nose or anything off the start.
Josh Smith: I think a lot of that stuff is learned, and it's learning, not even just, I think, more importantly than being able to pick these things up is learning the words to describe them.
Josh Smith: Because I think that's the part that people, you know, if you can really accurately describe what it is that you're smelling, then that's kind of the important part.
Josh Smith: But yeah, just practicing and going through the process as I've been learning and playing around. It's definitely developed. I've noticed a lot more things than I used to.
Josh Smith: Yeah, I'm picturing like a sommelier who describes wine with like apricot notes and a hint of chocolate or something. Yeah, a subtle hint of Blackberry or whatever, yeah. I've got maybe one cologne that my wife gave me a long time ago and I haven't really
Josh Smith: thought about it in this much detail before.
Filip Valica: The popularity of your brand kind of sword this summer, you were reviewed by. someone pretty big in the space can you talk about that yeah um so i was reviewed by luca
Josh Smith: turin and he's a um a scientist uh who's done a lot of work with with uh smell and how how we
Josh Smith: smell and he's also um a very renowned uh perfume reviewer um he's released a few books and um yeah i was
Filip Valica: super grateful to i ended up um i got a hint that he was looking for kind of niche perfumers to
Josh Smith: to review and just randomly sent a box full of perfumes to his place and didn't really expect much of it.
Josh Smith: And I was very grateful to open the email and realize that he had actually reviewed them. And it was their positive reviews. But yeah, he's actually doing that for for a number of niche perfumers.
Josh Smith: And I think that's sort of forward looking in the industry. I think he's kind of got his thumb on the pulse a little bit in terms.
Filip Valica: terms of where things are going,
Filip Valica: which, yeah, so that was a, that was a great experience for for me. You didn't give yourself really a whole lot of credit there. I'm going to quote the last sentence on his review, all in all superb work, the sort that makes keeping a blog like this one
Josh Smith: worth it. Yeah, I guess I have a, I have a hard time talking about myself a little bit, but yeah, no, that was, that was really amazing and had no expectations of it. But yeah, that was, that was fantastic. Certainly would have kept me awake for days.
Josh Smith: Yeah, yeah. So congratulations on that. How did you find out that he was looking for some niche brands to test? Actually, it was through a Facebook group that I'm part of
Filip Valica: joined up with a bunch of, there's a bunch of kind of perfumer forums and then also a few Facebook groups and someone who runs a website that
Josh Smith: kind of collects and reviews and provides resources to get in contact with niche brands.
Josh Smith: Dr. Turn had contacted him, and he sent the call-out to all a bunch of people. That's a great opportunity. And even, I would say even if the review wasn't 100% positive like it was, I think it
Josh Smith: would have given you that feedback that you were looking for, that validation, that there's somebody else in the industry that values the work that you're doing. Oh, absolutely. And I mean, it's such a, I mean, in terms of, you know, kind of.
Josh Smith: of the big, big companies and big perfume houses, it's such a, I guess, ivory tower of an industry. There's, you know, it's very invisible. It's very hard to know what's going on in
Josh Smith: the inside and it's full of very large, kind of luxurious companies. So, yeah, it was definitely
Josh Smith: very humbling and it was excellent to have that validation that, you know, I could compete maybe in that world and it wouldn't, yeah, wouldn't be looked down upon by some of the bigger guys.
Josh Smith: Did you find that review to be really helpful for your sales, or can you kind of describe the trajectory of your sales from when you left your design program to that point? Yeah.
Josh Smith: It's been, I guess, pretty steadily building.
Josh Smith: I think in the sort of first little while of it, luckily I picked a product that I think there is a need for, and that was validated fairly early when,
Filip Valica: And I went from, I ended up in about 12 stores in a year going from no, like in no retailers to being picked up by a bunch of people and all really amazing little kind of boutique shops, which is, which is exactly where I want to be anyways.
Filip Valica: So all of them looking for kind of a niche or just like a smaller perfume company and not really finding much from North America.
Josh Smith: So, yeah, that validated that right away when they just kept getting offers to be in, in different little. spots. And that was really great. And then following that review, that actually seemed to open
Josh Smith: things up in terms of international sales a little bit more often. And people that were really, really into perfumes, I think the stores that I was in, they do really well for people who maybe
Josh Smith: aren't, you know, obsessed with perfumes or fragrances and cosmetics and things. But, you know, you pick something up and it's a little different than what you'd find in kind of a department in store. So you're able to give it more of a chance.
Filip Valica: Did really well with that crowd. And then following that review, it sort of opened things up to the people who are really, you know,
Josh Smith: embedded in that market and buy a lot of fragrances. So that was great. Now I want to dive into that a little bit more. You talk about the different audiences in your market. When you were creating these, you know, you were getting some feedback from the initial set of products that
Josh Smith: you were making and maybe the the feedback was just from your design school how did that translate into creating i don't want to say an avatar but creating your different audience segments um
Josh Smith: that's actually been really one of the harder things um and just sort of getting a handle on that now
Josh Smith: uh but that was basically um i was i was mostly crafting them based on kind of the locations of of stores that were vetting for my product and asking to,
Josh Smith: you know, for more information that way and sort of looking at what products they were selling and what other brands they carried
Josh Smith: and imagining, you know, customers from that,
Josh Smith: along with getting kind of whatever little tidbits of information from analytics and whatnot, but mostly just through those other retailers because
Filip Valica: they all have their own sort of personality. So you can kind of imagine who is shopping there based on the store itself. That seems just really challenging to be able to nail down your audience away from 18 to 55 male slash female.
Filip Valica: Yeah, exactly. Pretty broad category, absolutely.
Josh Smith: Yeah, I mean, and I guess I do get some interaction with those shows and sales that I do where it's definitely like a face-to-face interaction. You're getting feedback and you're seeing, you know, smell the product and try it on
Josh Smith: and come back saying, you know, with whatever feedback. So you get to see the types of people who are investing in it more. And it has been actually pretty wide open.
Josh Smith: Like I do, I would say probably 18 to maybe 30 would be like the best age range. But there's definitely quite a, it goes quite a bit higher than that.
Josh Smith: So it has been really difficult to nail down, you know, that exact sort of avatar.
Josh Smith: That's who the who the Libertine customer is. But, yeah, slowly working on that and just trying to – I'm actually just recently started – I hired a couple other really amazing kind of local publicist
Josh Smith: slash designer people to help me walk through that stuff because it was really hard to get a handle of it on my own despite going, you know, being a designer by trade. Daring down your audience is one of my major challenges that I'm going through right now.
Josh Smith: So that's one of the reasons that I've asked you about it. Yeah. Good on you to hire. somebody you know most people just slug it out on their own for a while can you kind of talk about
Josh Smith: at what point you decided that you're ready to hire your first contractor or first helper um i mean i've been slowly getting to that um that point uh the design i was surprised that the first
Josh Smith: sort of i guess service that i inquired about or hired was also a designer um or set of designers
Filip Valica: but you know I've been able to sort of slug through some of the you know I guess more menial tasks which you know takes a lot of time and that is what I'm now starting to look at farming out
Filip Valica: or contracting out and getting some help with that because up until now it's just been sort of
Josh Smith: myself and then a little bit of help from from friends when when things get crazy but part of the reason that I chose to hire some designers to help me with that part was that I guess looking at it, you know, I can,
Josh Smith: through my skills gained from school, I can, I can kind of tear apart other brands and pick out what's going on with them and who they're trying to speak to, but looking into myself, it has always been really difficult, you know, sort of essentially
Josh Smith: being the brand and being, being more complicated, you know, like people are more, more complex than brands usually are supposed to be. So it's just as my taste changed, so with the brand a little
Josh Smith: bit. And I was having a hard time knowing who exactly why I was speaking to because it was too much from myself.
Josh Smith: And I would just sort of, I kept redoing or, you know, just doing slight tweaks to design work and whatnot and realize, you know, like I'm on a really solid path, but I just
Josh Smith: need to get some outside help from some people. And I chose to, rather than asking designer
Filip Valica: friends, I chose specifically two people that didn't know me so that there wouldn't be that issue where, you know, friends are either not wanting to hurt your feelings or whatever. So that was one way of trying to get a little bit more honest critique. But, yeah. Talk about your timeline a little bit.
Filip Valica: You graduated school and you started working on some of these batches and maybe creating
Josh Smith: a larger product line and then getting into stores. How long did all that take before you started getting into these stores before you were reviewed? Actually,
Josh Smith: I started out with the timeline. And it would have been, I mean,
Josh Smith: two years ago, probably officially deciding I'm going to do this as a product and try it for that pop-up shop. It's actually mostly been going on. It's been going on longer while I was in my program than out of it. I just graduated in December.
Josh Smith: So it has, yeah, it's grown quite a bit since then. But my last year of school was school plus this. And so I was in in the first year,
Josh Smith: maybe probably about six or seven stores by the end of the year. And then that in the past six months has doubled.
Josh Smith: And I'm actually getting to the point now where I'm not too sure in terms of just being able to spend the time with production.
Josh Smith: That's why I'm looking at ramping up is because I'm almost having to turn down wholesalers or wholesale offers, just because I don't think,
Josh Smith: I just want to be able to keep actually supplying people. And then with the impending holiday season, definitely going to need some help to get all my retailers stocked as well as the different sales that I do elsewhere.
Filip Valica: Yeah, and you do all your blending and mixing, packaging in-house.
Josh Smith: Can you talk a little bit about that and the types of equipment that you use maybe? And to me, it would seem like it'd be easy to contaminate the equipment with a certain sense.
Josh Smith: so you'd have to kind of like wash it all down and and start again with another batch.
Josh Smith: Yeah.
Josh Smith: So it's essentially just a lot of kind of lab glassware and then and then a fairly accurate scale like I said. And I use a lot of perfumers alcohol is kind of readily available.
Josh Smith: So that's perfect for disinfecting things as well as having kind of smooth, non-porous surfaces. So creating a batch, it's mostly just I've got.
Josh Smith: got some spreadsheets set up with all the ingredients and kind of weights that need to go into things that update as I as I add things and just essentially start taking out bottles
Josh Smith: and dropper dropping them into to beakers and you get the correct formula following that
Filip Valica: it needs to sit for preferably a few weeks in whatever medium I use coconut oil and perfumers alcohol, but to make sure that it's really blended and aged properly. So it has to sit for
Filip Valica: about, yeah, hopefully six weeks is the kind of minimum amount of time, which is really difficult for, I guess, being agile in terms of stalking people. Yeah, it sounds like it.
Filip Valica: Yeah, and then following that, it's filtered and then bottles. So, but yeah, mostly just washing
Josh Smith: in terms of disinfecting things. It's a lot of spraying it down with alcohol and giving it a good wash before any work takes place. So I'm going back to my wine analogy. What is the largest container that you store some of these batches in while they're waiting to be aged?
Josh Smith: While they're waiting, it's probably about a liter,
Josh Smith: which is in the scheme of things in terms of a lot of other, you know, looking at other bigger companies that's pretty small, which I'm sure there's, you know, giant vats of Chanel number five or whatever being mixed up right now.
Josh Smith: But yeah, it's about a liter. My filtering thing is two and a half liters. So I'm just actually, I haven't released anything on it yet,
Filip Valica: but just starting to break into, for the Christmas season, I want to release a couple things more towards cosmetics. I wanted to do a body oil and a hair oil.
Filip Valica: And the first thing that I ran into with that is just the quantity is so much higher. Yeah.
Josh Smith: So that's been one of the great things about perfume is that it's been,
Josh Smith: And in terms of looking at, you know, I studied furniture design and whatnot. So definitely a lot of space required. But so just to have a product that's, you know, got a pretty good margin that is so small is really great.
Josh Smith: But yeah, this cosmetic line is definitely getting larger. And I'm going to need to upgrade some equipment to handle that if it takes off.
Filip Valica: Now, as an engineer, I'm excited.
Josh Smith: I'd want to go and see your lab and see how you do all this stuff. Thanks for giving us a window into that. Yeah, absolutely. So as you're ramping up now for, we're recording a bit early, we're recording at the end of September,
Filip Valica: and you're ramping up for Christmas,
Filip Valica: what are your thoughts in terms of how much volume that you're expecting to see and how have you been able to project that to make sure that you have, like you said, you have enough production?
Josh Smith: I mean, with kind of looking up some other kind of the industry standards in terms of, in terms of volume, I think most major perfume companies expect 60% of sales in the Christmas season.
Josh Smith: And I'm definitely, it will be similar to that.
Josh Smith: And most of my sales are done.
Josh Smith: It's a pretty even split between me getting out and doing sort of one-on-one sales and my retailers.
Josh Smith: So, yeah, it's definitely just looking at past numbers and looking at what I've sold, you know,
Filip Valica: throughout the year thus far and just making my best guess and trying to be kind of as accurate
Josh Smith: to that as possible. So there's, you know, not too much excess, but I'm able to, able to stock all I can. Yeah, you don't leave anybody wanting more, especially as you near Christmas and people are looking for that last minute gift. And you mentioned selling directly. I mean, are you just
Josh Smith: popping open your trunk in the car and people are coming in? What do you mean by selling direct? um i guess so i've uh kind of my my major uh money maker in terms of of those things just different
Josh Smith: sales around town like there'll be kind of christmas sales with local um kind of local makers and
Filip Valica: things so yeah i'm sort of straddling that line um and trying to grow a little bit uh so where i'm in retailers but still able to hit that kind of more uh locally made crowd right like a
Josh Smith: boutique type of feel yeah exactly the margin are just really great when I'm, you know, doing those sales. So like trade shows that have kind of a sales component or kind of more along the like Christmas craft market type
Josh Smith: things. So talk about that a little bit, trade shows. I love going to trade shows personally, but that can also be the worst thing to go to if you don't have the budget to spend on a booth
Filip Valica: right away in the beginning. When did you first start going to trade shows and how have you found them to be for your product? Actually, the only,
Filip Valica: I haven't gone. I haven't gone. selling to any trade shows for for my industry yet but yeah I'm just I've just started looking into them now and I mean yeah the especially when there's a
Josh Smith: sales component that that helps to to offset the the cost but yeah the costs are
Josh Smith: pretty pretty steep so that'll be and I have to be very careful about which I'm planning to hopefully do to in the coming year but you know being really careful about which ones
Josh Smith: uh to do and which ones are going to be the most beneficial in terms of the the crowd they draw in right yeah and and are you your target more individuals or wholesalers or retailers at this
Josh Smith: point um i mean i'm trying right now to to target uh more individuals i'm trying to boost online sales um just doing trying to do a lot more in terms of content marketing and and things and
Josh Smith: really get that going but it is hard selling kind of you know aromas online uh when people can't actually
Filip Valica: smell them that easily. So that's been difficult. But yeah,
Filip Valica: for now, I'm trying to target a few more, more of the individuals. But I'm also looking at some more retailers in the States. Pretty much all my retailers right now are in Canada. So I guess I have a bigger market
Filip Valica: down there. So is your goal with individuals just mainly to get the word out and with the thought process of, you know, if I get into more individuals and get them to try it, more people will
Filip Valica: be exposed to it and therefore they'll kind of drive sales um yeah totally um and it's been a lot of um and just creating that sort of online presence doing a lot of the uh the online branding and that sort
Josh Smith: of thing um really you know trying to project an image of what i want liberty team to be and what i want people to associate it with so so they do have a reference point for you know hopefully they have a friend that bought it and so they know the product is good but then they're also really
Josh Smith: able to easily kind of invest in that brand image. Yeah, and so you seem to be really clear on that. I would have struggled a little bit with that because I guess my thought would have run
Josh Smith: into, well, if I sell larger volumes to wholesalers, I'm not having to deal with as many transactions. And so it might be easier on me on the short run to handle, you know, larger volume orders with more money behind them.
Josh Smith: I guess right now, especially, you know, I'm hoping to really after this Christmas season,
Josh Smith: start ramping things up and, I guess, contracting out a few more tasks and looking into maybe a separate space for Libertine.
Josh Smith: So at this point, you know, it's the margins that are really important to me right now. And selling individually, you know, you just make so much more per transaction that it's, yeah, it's just, it's harder to,
Josh Smith: you spend a lot more time making a lot less money despite, you know, the orders being bigger. And it's always nice, you know, being in retailers. It's also, you know, you get that,
Josh Smith: I guess, you know, it really sort of proves your product good when you have retailers purchasing it as well in large quantities. But, but yeah, for now, you know, I want to ramp up my production a little bit so that I can actually approach
Josh Smith: more retailers confidently. So talk about dealing with retailers now. I know you said that you're working with some of the smaller retailers around town. Can you blankantly talk about some of
Filip Valica: their policies and what kind of concessions you had to make and maybe some of the terms
Josh Smith: and conditions that they asked of you versus, for example, some of the bigger retailers will have, like you said, they seek really large margins and they're looking for you to front all
Josh Smith: the stock up front and maybe the terms are net 90, you're getting paid 90 days after they receive inventory. You have to take all returns regardless of, you know, the root cause, all sorts
Josh Smith: of other restrictive terms. How is it working with some of these smaller retailers?
Josh Smith: Well, I mean, it's been, it's been pretty good, especially, you know, you really get that, you know, it's one or two people running a shopper.
Filip Valica: So it's, it's really nice. Everything's fairly
Filip Valica: friendly in terms of that. You really get to know the people. So it is a fairly personal relationship. I did start with doing a lot of consignment for the first couple,
Josh Smith: which, so I would, I would provide the stock. I'd pay for shipping to get it to wherever. it was, wherever the store was, and then we'd usually, you know, clear up on a monthly basis, especially just to sort of get myself out there and make it really easy for the, for the retailer.
Josh Smith: There's no risk involved for them, essentially, so they can, you know, you can send,
Josh Smith: you know, your whole line as many bottles as really you want it, and they'll just sell it. And usually getting a little bit better payout in return, the margins will be a little nice,
Filip Valica: so usually 60-40 instead of a kind of 50-50 split.
Josh Smith: Now that I've established myself a little bit more, I'm not doing consignment anymore,
Josh Smith: it's a little closer to what you'd find in a big retailer, because they are more responsible for, it's a bigger risk on their part. So they don't pay, you don't make quite as much on each unit.
Josh Smith: Returns is one thing that luckily hasn't been a big issue. That's something that there either hasn't been a lot of or I haven't heard,
Josh Smith: I've dealt with a couple issues on a case-by-case basis with individual stores, but it's always been a fairly nice process and just something that we can work through on a personal level.
Filip Valica: Yeah, so the big retailers are also – it's a little scary in terms of that, and that's one thing that's – yeah, just forward-looking in terms of accepting any offers from bigger stores.
Filip Valica: For right now, it seems like it's easier to work with the people that are easy. to work with. Yeah, totally. Well, in my,
Josh Smith: I guess my market, I've been, I've sort of tried to set myself up a little bit in opposition to kind of the more well-established perfume houses and some of the, you know, just classic things you might find. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
Josh Smith: So that's really been, been part of the message. And so the smaller boutiques fit just better for that anyway.
Josh Smith: Yeah, you're not dealing with. It doesn't make quite as much sense to be opposition. but then sold alongside of those you're you know maybe calling out a little bit or poking fun at so so
Josh Smith: so how much business would you say is done through stores versus in your individual pop-up type sales versus online through your site like is a third each way or no it so far and they have been
Filip Valica: actually since that review online sales have picked up a little bit um but i have found it a lot of work to keep it going and to kind of, you know, you always got to be putting out little things to
Filip Valica: drive people to your site. But that's definitely the lowest, the lowest seller.
Filip Valica: Retailers and
Josh Smith: the other sort of direct sales things have been split about 50 or I guess whatever remaining sent, half and half between, between, you know,
Josh Smith: but the retailers, obviously, yeah, that's a lot more. I'm sending them a lot more product, so.
Josh Smith: Yeah. So you're dealing with larger volume. Have you looked into fulfillment by Amazon or anything like that? Not yet. Fulfillment's actually been probably one of the easier things. It's more the kind of manual labor of packaging, those types of things,
Josh Smith: that if I could outsource one thing, that would be sort of it. It puts me in an interesting position, though, because it's obviously the main creation of the fragrance, the blending of it is something that I
Josh Smith: at the moment at least, you know, have to be present for.
Filip Valica: So my packaging of whatever has to be done pretty locally as well whenever that, whenever decided to go that route and hand that off to other people.
Josh Smith: Yeah, you want to keep the close eye on quality? Yeah, absolutely. And it must be really difficult, too, because with some other products, you can create a quality plan and test that product against the quality plan.
Josh Smith: And even by some third-party independent inspector, you know, they can weigh it or they'll test the material or compare the color against a pantone color swatch.
Josh Smith: And with perfume, it must be almost impossible to have some third party come in and say, yeah, you know what? That smells just like the sample that we've got.
Josh Smith: Yeah, I think even, and in terms of the contract manufacturer that I was looking at and trying to figure out how our next step,
Filip Valica: it still seems that I will end up being quality control.
Filip Valica: they will basically recreate the formula and then send me samples to ensure that I you know it's up to the proper quality to my nose but yeah I mean you can do and there are there
Filip Valica: labs that'll test things you know more for quality of the material like just contamination
Josh Smith: in terms of a more of a safety thing and that's quite easy because they're just testing for things like bacteria and that sort of stuff but yeah no it's it's up to me every time and just being accurate to the formula and being really careful when I'm blending to make sure that it's the same as last time.
Josh Smith: My nose would get tired after testing a bunch of different samples. Do you ever feel that maybe you've been working for the last few weeks on different formulas and you come back to where you were, you know, a week or two ago and it smells different
Josh Smith: to you, even though the formula hasn't changed or the sample hasn't changed?
Josh Smith: I mean, yeah, I think,
Josh Smith: you know, I have throughout my products like, I create my whole line, even the things that have, you know, been sitting on the shelf for a while.
Josh Smith: It's just different moods will, we'll definitely draw out different things or I'll be way more in the mood for some things and, you know, like a sweeter, more floral thing will totally kind of turn me off and I'll definitely be drawn to something spicier.
Josh Smith: But also, you know, like I was saying about aging, if I, if I'm playing around with something and like it or don't like it, three weeks later, you know, that can, that can almost totally change just for the.
Josh Smith: the materials, all the molecules kind of like settling in and everything really getting into it's what it will finally smell like. So it is a little bit of a challenge in that way and making
Filip Valica: sure that you're coming up. You can't rush the process too too much.
Filip Valica: Otherwise, yeah, you could end up with a product that in three weeks time might smell a little different and not exactly like you wanted
Josh Smith: it. So yeah, that seems like a huge challenge instead of a little challenge. Yeah.
Josh Smith: Well, I mean, yeah, I just came up with. I released my newest fine fragrance, smoked bloom. It's a smoky floral scent. But that one, the first few that I was releasing, especially when I was kind of just learning and going through the process,
Josh Smith: it was quite a bit faster. But now both for my own nose, maybe becoming a little pickier,
Josh Smith: it took a lot longer. It took close to a year to finally settle on this one fragrance. And that was due to a lot of things of, you know, you'd pick it up in a couple weeks.
Filip Valica: and it wouldn't be either quite what you're going for or it would smell just a little bit different. And that little bit was, you know, kind of made it not quite what I wanted to release. Wow. No, that's, yeah, definitely challenging.
Filip Valica: You know, congrats on tackling all of that and, you know, producing this new scent and coming up with the whole line that I would say you could easily be proud of.
Filip Valica: I mean, it is, you know, nationally recognized or internationally recognized. Yeah, thank you. Thank you. Yeah. looking back on your journey it seems like a very straightforward process but I'm sure it hasn't been
Josh Smith: can you talk about maybe some of the times that you hit some stumbling blocks um I mean I guess
Filip Valica: the whole the whole way that I went about it um sort of bootstrapping things uh I don't know if it's I don't know if I would have necessarily changed it but uh you know there are a lot of times
Filip Valica: when I look back on it and and wonder if it would have been easier just to you know do that initial thing, you know, finding investors or finding funding some other way. So I'd have a little bit more kind of wiggle room to play around with.
Filip Valica: Because the sort of constantly upgrading as I'm able, it's a little, it's a little difficult because you're sort of mentally engaged in how you can make, make the product better rather than, you know, putting out a product that you
Filip Valica: really like and is perfect kind of off the bat and having a little slower turnaround until you realize you may need to do a little update.
Filip Valica: Yeah,
Filip Valica: so that's been difficult. Also, just in general, trying to deal with as a smaller company, some of the regulatory association websites and whatnot. I'm wondering, you know, if what you're doing is actually correct.
Filip Valica: Because a lot of those things are, they're really geared towards larger companies with, you know, law teams and whatnot going through those websites. So there's been a few times where the regulations have,
Filip Valica: just been a little taxing but other than that it's you know it has been it's a lot of work but yeah definitely amazing experience so far well it sounds like you'd recommend it to other entrepreneurs and small business owners that are looking to create their own products
Filip Valica: what tip would you give them if they feel like they're kind of in the same shoes where they feel that there might be a little bit of stuck and they don't know if they should keep
Josh Smith: going forward probably not to make any decisions on on bad days would be my my thing. It seems that, you know, I've had,
Josh Smith: as different projects have come through and stress has increased, it's definitely, there's been a few days that were, you know, pretty challenging and a lot of times where, you know, the work just
Josh Smith: became a little overwhelming. But, you know, as much as that, you know, those sort of downswings come at, when, when everything's good, it's, it feels really amazing to, and to be able to
Josh Smith: put out a product that people are enjoying and have that, you know, out in the world. So, um, Yeah, I think holding off until things even out a little bit before making any major decisions. I mean, my best advice.
Josh Smith: Again, congrats on your amazing achievements, especially for creating a product that you're so connected to. This is obviously something that is important to you. It's part of you.
Josh Smith: And so you're getting to work on something that no one else knows as much about and is connected to as well as you are. And so there's a lot of reward in, I guess, seeing your creation.
Josh Smith: out there in the world making a difference in people's lives.
Josh Smith: Yeah, absolutely. Thank you. Congratulations on that. Where can people go and find out more about Libertine Fragrance and buy your product? So, I guess mainly my website, that would be Libertine.
Josh Smith: That's L-I-T-I-N-E-Dash-Fragrance.com.
Josh Smith: Awesome, and we'll have that in the show notes. So thanks again for coming on the show. So, you know, it was really great to hear all about the background on fragrances and how they're made.
Josh Smith: It was definitely something that was new to me and I found it super informative, Josh. So thanks again for being so transparent and sharing all your wisdom with us. Absolutely. Thank you so much for being on. It's been a pleasure.
Josh Smith: And that's all I've got for today. Thank you for listening. If you've got any questions or comments, I've put all the links that we've covered under the show notes posted on the product startup.com slash episode 30.
Filip Valica: Join me next time as I speak with Elizabeth Versace. She's the founder of Eco Cacoon and she worked with an industrial engineer and pioneered the cocoon cap, which is a stainless steel drinkware cap that's designed to be leak-free and spill-proof.
Filip Valica: We get into all the intricacies of developing a new design from the ground up and about using third-party technology inside of our own products. So don't miss that episode if you're looking to design your product from scratch.
Filip Valica: tune in next week to hear that episode. Just like any other small business owner, I'm looking for your feedback to make this the best podcast to listen to for creating physical products. So please let me know what you think of the show and what you want to hear more.
Filip Valica: And that way I can continue to create content that you find valuable. Thanks again for reaching out to me at the product startup.com and hitting the ask philip button or shooting me an email at philip at the product startup.com.
Filip Valica: Thanks again for joining me today and I'll see you. you guys next week. Thank you for listening to this episode of the Product Startup Podcast with your host, Philip Valisa. For more great content and to stay up today, visit theproduct startup.com.
Filip Valica: Your guide to getting there.
Filip Valica: Thanks for tuning into this episode of the Product Startup Podcast, the show that teaches you what it really takes to bring your product to market and turn it into a big success. This podcast series is brought to you by
Filip Valica: Mako Design and Invent, the first firm in North America to provide global caliber and end physical consumer product development to start-ups, inventors, and small product businesses.
Filip Valica: If you're looking for product development help on your invention, head over to macawdesign.com. That's m-a-k-o-design.com for a free consultation from one of Mako-Design for design studios from coast to coast. Thanks for listening and see you next time.
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