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My rating system allows a fragrance to score fairly highly, even if I don’t like it.

Some might find that strange, but there’s a good reason behind it. This post will break down how I formed my current fragrance rating system, and why I formed it the way I did.
The basis of it is simple; my approach is to enable objective analysis. I want my system to allow a well made fragrance to strut its stuff, even if my nose doesn’t like it.

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The Five Factors

I rate fragrances based on five factors or attributes. If you’ve read any of my more recent reviews, you’ll have seen that they are:

• Longevity
• Projection
• Presentation
• Blend Quality
• Subjective Smell

Each of these are allocated a mark out of 1, adding the total across all of them to a score out of 5.

You may be confused as to why I include a mark for personal preference if I already stated that I want a fragrance to be able to score highly, regardless of my taste.
Simply put, it’s this:
A personal review needs, in my opinion, some personal bias. Otherwise it’s just a technical piece. The reason we read reviews is to get other people’s views on things, so a review does need some personal bias.
However, it doesn’t need to be ruled by personal bias.

That’s how my mind plays it out.

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