Something smells at Bloomies…

Wednesday night, web editor Harry Sheff and I attended a GQ-sponsored event for Ray Ban at Bloomingdale’s SoHo store. It was a consumer event, but we thought we’d stop by to see the turn-out. After trying on a few pairs of Aviators and Wayfarers and sipping fruity, brightly colored drinks, we made our way up to the cologne counter on the street level.

Harry had just finished reading Perfumes: The Guide, which he’ll review in an upcoming issue of MR, so he wanted to smell some of the men’s scents he’d read about. I know I know, it sounds boring and irrelevant to menswear, but he swears it isn’t and now I see why.

Specifically, Harry wanted to know if Bloomingdale’s carried a cologne by Chanel that he wore when he was a teenager (Next time you see him, ask how he managed to score Chanel cologne as a teen. And if you know Harry, you know it’ll be an interesting story).

Tucked away, as the very last counter on the main floor was the men’s cologne selection. A friendly saleswoman approached us and asked what we’d like to try. Harry explained what he was looking for and before we knew it, there were countless sample papers, sprayed with cologne, all over the counter and we each had a bundle of coffee beans next to us (to smell in between colognes).

Leslie (the saleswoman) sucked us into the world of scents. We found ourselves intrigued by the fragrances but even more so by our fragrance storyteller. Leslie would describe the colognes, almost poetically, to us before we smelled them ourselves. “I never liked YSL, but then I was walking down an aisle in the grocery store and smelled something good. I looked up and a gorgeous man was standing before me. So I asked him, ‘What are you wearing?’ He laughed and said nothing, but his friend then called him out, ‘You know you’re wearing YSL.’ I love YSL now because I think of that beautiful man.” She winked and then handed over the paper to try.

As she was preparing another test paper she continued, “Cologne should never be too strong, just strong enough for a woman to wonder what it is, but light enough to make her want to come closer.” With that she handed us Cartier Roadster. This went on for about a half an hour when we had to stop (all the fragrances made us both a bit light-headed). Leslie sprayed Harry with Gucci by Gucci (Bloomie’s best seller) before we left and she gave us each her business card and a little brown bag of samples.

We learned something from Leslie last night. She sells a product that never goes on sale (but as she informed us if we open a Bloomingdale’s credit card we’d get 15 percent off today and tomorrow) and she is still making sales during this uncanny holiday period, where consumers are only buying on sale. It goes back to what seals the deal for most consumers: amazing customer service. We both left without making a purchase, but Leslie was so engaging that next time either of us are looking to buy cologne, we’ll do so from her.