House of Bō Goes Luxe With New Collection
A year after its launch, House of Bō is reaching higher for its second phase, both in price and in quality.
The brand, founded by Bernardo and Giancarlo Möller in 2021, has introduced a collection of parfums. Called the Tesoro Collection, it is comprised of three scents, each priced at $365 and launched exclusively with Bergdorf Goodman.
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The range is a more highly concentrated answer to the brand’s debut collection, a lineup of eaux de parfum developed by Givaudan’s Rodrigo Flores-Roux. Möller’s latest launches — named Rosario, El Sireno and Infinitoud — were developed by Firmenich’s Olivier Cresp, IFF’s Laurent Le Guernec and Carlos Benaïm, respectively. The fragrances are at parfum-level juice concentrations.
“We wanted to position ourselves in that niche, luxe space,” said Giancarlo Möller, which informed the brand’s decision to launch with Bergdorf Goodman. “When we did this new collection, knowing it would be a higher-end, more expensive product at a parfum concentration, we would need to have a partner that represented that level of quality.”
Rosario opens with notes of pomegranate, lemon primofiore and coriander; features heart notes of rose centifolia, freesia and white peony, and base notes of ambergris, vetiver and incense. El Sireno includes top notes of kelp, banana leaf and lavender; mid notes of magnolia, ylang-ylang and tuberose, and base notes of oakmoss, mastic and sandalwood. Infinitoud’s top notes include myrrh, vetiver and peyote; its middle notes include black pepper, cedarwood and patchouli, and base notes range from oud and incense to gurjun balsam.
Each fragrance is produced in limited batches, given the handmade perfume bottle caps in stones like rose quartz, blue onyx and black marble, hand-sculpted by artisans in Mexico.
“These are all hand-sculpted individual pieces and from the beginning, it was created to be this very artisanal perfume,” Bernardo Möller said. “It was never meant to be mass-produced, and this collection is taking that to another level, from the ingredients to the caps to the bottles.”
That value proposition seems to be resonating. Industry sources estimate the brand will reach between $6 million and $7 million in retail sales for 2022. According to data from The NPD Group, fragrance sales grew 11 percent to $1.3 billion in the third quarter of 2022, driven by higher prices and higher-concentration products.
The response on each launch has been “great so far,” Möller said, and he expects the fragrances to each appeal to different consumers. “They are all really very different, and there is a consumer for each one,” he continued. “We all agree that El Sireno might be the bestseller. They really are like children, you never know how they’re going to do.”
Following the launch, the brand is eyeing new territories for expansion. Mexico, Bernardo Möller’s home country, is first on the list, with plans to expand into the U.K. by the second quarter of 2023.
