- 6 mins
You’ve probably heard the term food deserts in North America, where low-income communities have limited access to fresh food. It’s a serious issue that leads to worse health outcomes, and I don’t want to trivialize that. But I think we’re starting to see a very similar phenomenon in the fragrance landscape in Canada.
Department Stores Disappearing
Over the last several years, major department stores have failed and exited the Canadian market. The Bay, Canada’s longest-running department store, closed its doors. While the specifics are complex, the closure appears to be a mix of leadership challenges, declining mall traffic, and high fixed costs. With The Bay gone, Saks and its offshoot Saks Off 5th also disappeared, wiping out around a total of 96 retail locations across Canada almost overnight.
Before The Bay’s downfall, Nordstrom had already left Canada. Nordstrom was more upscale and modern than The Bay, but it pulled out when it determined the Canadian market wasn’t financially viable. While The Bay carried a wide range of designer fragrances, Nordstrom and Saks focused more on the luxury niche, offering the upper spectrum of brands. They didn’t carry every brand their American stores had, but the major designers were still represented.
Even earlier, Sears Canada and Target Canada exited the market. Sears carried designers like Calvin Klein, Ralph Lauren, and Dolce & Gabbana, holding a similar position to The Bay, but closed in 2018. Target Canada left in 2015, selling mostly lower-tier designer scents, with a selection far smaller than its U.S. stores. With all these closures, many Canadian malls lost any place to test or buy fragrances in-person.
Limited Options for Canadians
Now, Canadians in medium to large cities often have just one major retailer like Holt Renfrew for in-person fragrance shopping. In smaller cities, the options are even thinner. Malls without a Sephora may have no fragrance retailer at all. There are some small independent perfume stores carrying basic designers or niche Middle Eastern fragrances, but they are few and often unknown to the broader market. Drugstores like Shoppers Drug Mart or London Drugs carry the basics, and occasionally higher-end brands if they have a dedicated beauty section—but the experience is not the same.
Even bigger cities are feeling the impact as stores like Etiket go out of business. You’ll still find retailers such as L’Occitane, Aesop, Lush, and other beauty brands that sell fragrances, but they only carry their own lines. This means that many designer fragrances are much harder to find in Canada. Lower-tier designers are generally still available, but that middle tier of designers—like Issey Miyake (outside of classics like L’Eau d’Issey Pour Homme)—has become increasingly difficult to locate and test in person.
The Department Store Experience
The charm of department store fragrance sections is hard to replicate. You could go with friends or a partner, take your time exploring multiple offerings, and easily spot new releases from major designers. Sales assistants would often help, but you didn’t feel pressured or out of place (your experience may differ). Sephora, by contrast, has more limited shelf space, smaller fragrance sections, and often crowded displays. It simply doesn’t provide the same relaxed, exploratory experience that department stores once offered.
The phrase “there’s no ethical consumption under capitalism” has been around for a while. Varanis Ridari mentions it in his video How to Buy Fragrance. Props to him for giving beginners solid advice on fragrance shopping. Essentially, it’s perfectly fine to smell fragrances in-store at department stores and then buy them online through discounters or the grey market. I’d echo this advice for beginners: you’re getting the exact same product without being overcharged.
But when these department stores began shutting down or leaving the market, part of me wondered: was I part of the problem? I never actually bought fragrances from these stores during their existence. Sometimes I felt a twinge of sympathy for the sales assistants, who might not earn commissions anymore—but ultimately, they were there to maximize corporate profit, and I wasn’t going to feel guilty for that. Going back to the saying, under capitalism, the responsibility doesn’t fall on the customer to sustain a company. Plus, around 40% of luxury sales come from the top 2% of consumers, so maybe the blame lies more with them.
For smaller, independent companies like Etiket, there’s a stronger case for buying in-store to support local businesses. Even then, though, you’re still operating within capitalism, and the products are usually luxury items made outside Canada. Stores make healthy margins on fragrances, so there’s an argument for supporting local boutiques—but if you can get the same luxury niche scents online for 30–40% off, I’m not blaming the consumer for choosing the discounter.
Where does this leave us?
With department store closures, there might actually be a silver lining. Some people may be pushed to explore smaller independent boutiques like Scentrique in Vancouver, Parfum Exquis in Montreal, or Niche Essence in Toronto. The real opportunity, I think, lies with stores that focus on indie fragrances, and that brings me to Indiescents. This isn’t a paid sponsorship; I gain nothing from mentioning these shops.
People will always gravitate toward designers and luxury niche brands, but small indie stores offer a refreshing alternative. Indie fragrances are often competitively priced with designer scents and generally more affordable than luxury niche options. You also get something far more unique while supporting independent perfumers at the same time.
If I’m being a pessimist, though, there’s a downside: more people might end up blind-buying fragrances or spending more money on sample sets. This isn’t unique to Canada. Sephora largely stopped providing free samples, and luxury retailers like Holt Renfrew have scaled back as well. Places like Hermès boutiques within Holt Renfrew used to give out generous samples for free, but now that’s mostly reserved for established clients with money to burn. Even purchasing samples outright is often limited to pre-packaged sets.
We can’t really complain about the loss of freebies, but it’s clear that we’re living in a very different era for fragrance discovery.
Additional Pains
It’s not all smooth sailing for smaller boutiques like Indiescents. Many have had to stop shipping to the U.S. due to tariffs, even though American customers were a significant part of their base simply because of population size. Canada is slowly evolving, trying to reduce its trade reliance on the U.S. while opening more opportunities with Europe and China. If shipping with European partners becomes easier, that could be a real opportunity for fragrances. However, trade agreements take time, and it’s uncertain how many small shops will survive these changes over the next few years.
Even though Canada is right above the U.S., shipping fragrances here is surprisingly complicated. It’s not just full bottles that are difficult to import—samples face similar restrictions. This is why Canadian indie shops are so valuable: they solve the accessibility problem, but they can only carry a limited number of fragrance houses. Combine that with our weaker Canadian dollar, and fragrances become an even more inaccessible hobby.
As fragrance enthusiasts, we adapt. Many rely on Facebook groups and online communities to discover new scents, but these come with their own risks. Market changes like these make it challenging for Canadians to get into the hobby. With worsening wealth inequality and systemic barriers, I sometimes worry that the community could become more insular and less diverse. For an elite “snob club,” that might be fine—but the fragrance community thrives on diversity across age, socioeconomic background, and personal interests, and we should protect that.