How do u make someone smell through a screen? You don't

Who is NASO

Crafted with exquisite ingredients, carefully and lovingly grown in-house at their distilleries in North India. NASO stands as an artisanal perfumery. With its new & normal culture and it's youthful approach to extenuate the rich set of authentic ingredients, it classifies as a youthful energy in it's very own ‘green’ way. They use the pure extract from herbs and spices India has to offer in their signature fragrances.

Natural Indian 'attar' is the base of all their essences - making them free of all synthetic or artificial essences, providing their audience with a long lasting aura. With a blend of the modern floral oils from the Northern Europe, Egypt and Indonesia, their blends are carefully curated to suit all skin types and most of all, all palettes. 

NASO’s goal is to stay true to the ancient soul of Indian perfumery, and make the process 100% sustainable. To reinvent its traditional techniques and to serve a global audience with modern sensibilities. They feel that smell preaches a sense of familiarity; a sense of the known and a mystery of the unknown. NASO wants to create and reciprocate those fond memories, through their scents.

At NASO, they are extremely concious of the environment and hence encourage recyling, upcycling and reusing throughout the production cycle. As part of their candle re-fill program, they also re-use packagaing for deliveries.

Their belief in ZERO tolerance for waste has led them to convert all leftover production materials into biofertilizers that are then used as compost for their plantation.They, not only make the best use of rain water harvesting but also use solar energy to power their in-house distilleries.

Their newest campaign is “Embodying Sarawak” celebrating their one year anniversary with an exquisute new fragrance.

Pandemic

NASO stood as a 2 month old niche start-up stay-at-home orders were issued across the country. It was an extremely uncertain time for everyone and especially a new luxury start up. With launch plans getting cancelled one after the other it was extremely difficult for NASO to establish themselves in the market.

Nevertheless, with a couple months of ground work NASO took the pandemic head on and soon realised that there was an upside to it afterall. Eventhough they spent their launch year locked down, Astha Suri, founder says “(lockdown) opened varied of horizons in smell testing and making we didn’t even know existed.”

The lockdown gave them a chance to educate the customer about their ingredient base which wouldn’t have been possible with the hustle of offline pop ups or promotions. The audience responded well to the perfume making process that was shared through their social media in the form of a gallery of pictures giving the audience a journey through their in-house perfumery.

One of the main concerns that came about was shortage of ingredients due to transportational issues, this was dealt was graciously as their in-house perfumery and supplier worked together to make sure that this particular issue was not a hinderance.

The new focus immediately became online shopping. But how does one make someone make u make someone smell through a screen? You don’t. It is impossible to deliver a olfactory experience virtually. The focus had to be turned to sampling. NASO’s samples were soon converted into testing kits through the purchase of which, the customer could gauge their scent.

The fragrance industry is finally responding to the shift to online shopping.

Chance to redivert focus on green

This situation has did not alter the concern for the environment. In fact, it has accelerated it. This concept we call ‘new hygiene’ means being aware that, as well as looking after the planet, we have to look after ourselves and our health, too.

Mother- Father day increase in sales Candles

An increase in sales was recorded during 2020’s Mother’s and Father’s day, seeing as everyday spendings for everyone were low due to staying at home, there was an excess of disposal income and everyone was thinking about their loved ones in. Another increase in sales was for candles. NASO’s pure soy wax candles flew off the shelves, leaving them sold out of their customer favourite in their very first year in the business. Candles provide a sense of calm and have its own unique healing properties, this appealed to the customers as the lockdown was a time during which everyone was left feeling lonely and anxious.

Sanitisers

NASO’s very first response was to do their own bit by launching sanitizers.Having an in-house distillery made this process extremely easy. NASO takes pride in the fact that they contributed to the society by providing free sanitisers for anyone who asked for one.

Mental health awareness / #nasotalks igtv series

Naso associates itself as a youthful perfumery, a platform that they plan on building to talk about all things. Wellness from the in to the out. Through #NasoTalks, they intended to commemorate mental health awareness month by spreading wellness education by partnering up with various artists of different forms.

“We target men and women empowerment and release ways of gender biased behaviour when it comes to talking about mental health.

We as humans are responsible to keep one another healthy and growing.

We wish to build a community which stands for the same, through our baby steps for the same.

We hope you enjoy your annual health prescription from us, by illuminating you from the within.”

“Wellness” took a whole new meaning for everyone during 2020, especially in the perfume industry. A clear example in the world of perfume is the integration of aromatherapy. NASO was already on board the wellness train as all their products contain unique healing powers and their multiple variants of diffuser oils and candles.

NASO belives that their audience is now well versed with their philosophy. The audience they’ve had through 2020 has been loyal and continues to grow.

The positives outcomes have definitely been the changes in people’s shopping habits and the major change the perfume industry has gone through having been forced to sell smells through screens.

The pandemic did threaten the perfume industry highly however, they have only risen stronger through it.

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