What to say in your intro? Share where you're from, your reason for joining, perhaps your favorite fragrance, watch or a picture of you dressed sharp! It's a small action, but a HUGE step in you getting value from this community becasue you go from being a lurker to an ACTIVE member. In fact men that introduce themselves are 10X more likely to the actions to becoming their best selves. Bonus Point - By introducing yourself you're guaranteed to level-up. Seriously, you'll get at least 5-20 likes/points (oftentimes more) which will move you to level 2 and possibly level 3. And just like that you have access to more of this community!

I'm not going to get into my fragrance journey here. I've touched on bits and pieces of it over the past few years on this community. I'm just going to touch on what knocked me out of neutral and back interested in finding the next perfect fragrance. It started with two things; covid and my imagination. We all had too much time on our hands when we were locked down during that early time. While others may have embraced sourdough starters and banana bread, I looked at it as the perfect time to reinvent myself. I began working out again and I decided it was a great opportunity to explore the world of fragrance and see what my next signature scent would be. I already had a picture in my mind of what I wanted to find. This should have been my first clue that, even though I live in the south where it's warm nine months out of the year, I'm a sucker for a winter fragrance. Here's what I was hunting - let me set the scene. It's night. There's a winter storm outside. The wind is whipping and the cold is trying to find its way into the room I'm in. It's a big, classic, masculine study, just like you'd find in the movies. Dark wood everywhere. Bookcases filled with classics. A roaring fireplace. And a big, plush, well worn leather chair, where you smell not only the quality leather, but the history of generations who sat there contemplating life before you were born. You can still pick up the faint scent of the cigars and pipes that were used decades before by those who were there before you. On the stand next to the chair, a favorite book and a glass of bourbon. The only light in the room came from the fireplace, a lamp back in the corner by the big executive desk and the occasional flashes of lightning in the windows. That's what I was hunting. I wanted all those smells and all that vibe in a bottle that I could spray on me. I wanted the leather and the wood and the smoke and the books and the tobacco and the bourbon and the chill from the wind and the sweat and the history and the darkness. That's what set me on my journey.

Thanks to the brotherhood I finally jumped into some Xerjoff discovery sets. @Paul Bartnicki and I had talked about Xerjoff last winter and I had bumped into La Capitale which I loved and I finally decided to buy a discover set 😎 so I picked one of their pre set discovery sets and then out of the corner of my eye they had a button that said create your own 😳 So I like any good addict bought some of that too 😜. They were kind enough to throw in some “free” crack samples as well just like any good drug dealer would do. Truthfully I’m very excited to explore Xerjoff. While on the pricey side for sure at least their discovery packs are 15mls so I’ll get some great experience with them. So let the games begin!!

I had a pretty great WIN today. A fragrance order arrived from my SA (Sales Associate), and when I opened the package I found an absolutely ridiculous assortment of samples, discovery sets and gifts from houses throughout the fragrance department. 😂 And then came the biggest surprise: A full 50ml tester bottle of Golden Wood from The Harmonist. 😳 That one stopped me. My SA is actually with Armani. He’s also the person who first introduced me to The Harmonist, and I’ve since become a fan of the house and added several of their fragrances to my collection. But I don’t have a relationship with The Harmonist SA. I’ve never even met them. When I asked my guy about the bottle, he told me he’d gone over to The Harmonist and their SA offered the 50ml Golden Wood for me, explaining that these bottles were generally being reserved for their top clients. Apparently they know me through him. And THAT is where this became about much more than a free bottle of fragrance. I’ve spent my entire professional life in sales and building a business, and one lesson has followed me through all of it: Relationships matter. Building them matters. Maintaining them matters. Taking care of people matters. And loyalty has to work in both directions. We live in a world where it’s incredibly easy to go online, type in the name of something we want, sort by price and buy from whoever happens to be cheapest that day. And sometimes that’s perfectly fine. But I’ve never believed that the lowest price automatically means you got the best deal. My SA knows I’m a fragrance enthusiast. He knows what I own and is learning what I like. He’s willing to walk me away from his own Armani counter and introduce me to other houses and other SAs simply because he thinks there’s something I should experience. That’s actually how I discovered The Harmonist in the first place. And I try to reciprocate. Whenever possible, I make sure my business goes through him. He also knows my wife is every bit as interested in fragrance as I am. So while putting together this frankly absurd assortment of things for me to explore 😂, he made sure there were things specifically for her as well. That may sound like a small detail. It isn’t.

My daughter just sent this to me with a note that said, "This could be you.🤣" Yes, it's satire, but disturbingly relatable. Lol. ATLANTA, GA — Brittney Crawford, 31, was arrested Saturday evening at a Sephora inside Lenox Square Mall after staff say she camped out at the fragrance counter for six straight hours, sampled 84 perfumes onto various parts of her body, and refused to leave until she found one her ex-boyfriend would "regret." According to the report, Crawford arrived at the store at 12:14 p.m. carrying a Stanley cup, a notebook, and a portable phone charger. She told a sales associate she was "doing research" and would need "the entire wall to herself for a few hours." Staff say Crawford: - Began on the niche fragrance side and worked her way left in alphabetical order - Sprayed each scent on a different body part — wrists, neck, behind the knees, inside the elbows - Took notes in her notebook under columns labeled "REGRET LEVEL" and "MAKE HIM CRY" - Asked the consultant whether any of them smelled "like the woman he should have stayed with" - Reapplied a previous fragrance, declared "this one is closer," and started over - Drank a full Celsius energy drink at the counter at hour three - Plugged her phone into the testing station's outlet - Performed a slow lap of the store at hour four "to let them settle" - Returned to the counter at hour five and demanded a "scent consultation specialist" By hour six, customers had reportedly stopped approaching the fragrance wall entirely. One sales associate told police, "she had a strategy. We could not interrupt it." Fulton County deputy Marcellus Whittaker confirmed the arrest. "She did not steal anything. She did not yell. She simply refused to stop. She was on perfume number 84 when we arrived, and she asked if we could 'wait twelve minutes for the cedar to come through.'" Crawford allegedly told deputies she had "narrowed it down to seven finalists" and that her ex "wouldn't know what hit him." She was charged with criminal trespass.