Fragrance is a longtime favorite Valentine’s Day gift, and for good reason: Some pleasing smells can trigger the release of dopamine and serotonin, contributing to feelings of happiness and well-being.
Choosing a fragrance isn’t just about how it smells, but also about what is actually in the bottle. Some can contain chemicals of concern, but knowing which ingredients to avoid can help you make a safer choice.
The association between February 14 and love reaches back to an ancient Roman fertility festival. It intensified in the 19th century, when sentimental traditions like personalized, fancy, often scented cards grew in popularity.
Fast forward to the 2020s: Total U.S. spending on fragrance for the big day is estimated to top $25 billion this year.
So many choices – how to choose?
There are thousands of fragrance brands, so no matter who you’re shopping for, the options abound.
There’s just one hitch: Most fragrance is a mystery cocktail of chemicals.
The lack of transparency is troubling – leaving consumers guessing about what they're putting on their skin. It makes fragrance shopping tricky, and it’s why knowing what is in a scent matters just as much as how it smells.
Fragrance producers often provide limited transparency about the ingredients in their product mixtures, hiding behind claims of confidential business information.
Only partial disclosure rules exist, such as California’s requirement to disclose hazardous ingredients and allergens in fragrance. At the federal level, the Food and Drug Administration won expanded authority to set standards for fragrance allergen labeling requirements in a 2022 update to a cosmetics safety law. But the FDA is late in releasing those standards.
Potential health consequences
Some fragrance chemicals are not benign. Exposure can lead to a range of health problems, including hormone disruption.
Certain fragrance chemicals are phthalates, which can harm the reproductive system. Another fragrance chemical, styrene, is linked to cancer. The lack of disclosure of fragrance chemicals can also cause allergic reactions in kids and adults.
Fragrance chemicals are also bad for the environment: Chemical vapors in fragrance, called volatile organic compounds, can contribute to ozone pollution and form fine particulates, according to one study.
Thirty-five percent of participants in a 2023 EWG-commissioned survey use fragrance daily – exposure that adds up over time.
Here’s how to choose
EWG can help you sift through the seemingly infinite number of fragrance options.
Start with our free, searchable database, Skin Deep®, which rates about 130,000 products based on their hazards. Products with a rating of 1 or 2 are considered low hazard.
Concerns about transparency in fragrance are one reason EWG created EWG Verified®. When you see the EWG Verified mark on a product, you can be sure it’s free from chemicals that our scientists have determined to be hazardous, and that the product meets our strictest standards for your health.
EWG Verified scents are not only made with safer ingredients, they also contain fewer ingredients, lowering the risk of toxicity.
The first brand to earn the mark was Henry Rose. Like other brands and scent websites, Henry Rose offers a “find your scent” quiz designed to help you identify your favorite fragrance type.
Today several other brands have earned the EWG Verified mark, including:
- DIME’s 7 Summers, with top notes of “juicy pear,” vanilla orchid and “blonde woods.”
- Qet, with rosewood and jasmine botanical nectars.
- Rosy & Earnest, available in a discovery set.
- Uncommon James’ Hard Feelings, whose top notes are pink pepper and bergamot.
- Layermore’s Amal, with floral, amber and musk notes.
- Just the Goods’ fragrance, in a handful of individual scents.
- The Golden Secrets Signature Blend Essential Oil Perfume.
The packaging and presentation of these scents more than hold their own against traditional fragrance. And these products offer the added benefit of helping you reduce exposure to hazardous chemicals.
A gift of fragrance should feel like an act of care, not a leap of faith. Choosing scents made with ingredients fully disclosed to EWG and reviewed to ensure they contain none of our chemicals of concern helps protect your loved ones and yourself from unnecessary chemical exposure.
Romance should not come with hidden risks. The best Valentine’s Day gifts are the ones that come from the heart while also safeguarding health and well-being.
