Empowering Brands with Elena Skountzos

Written Interview

Elena Skountzos, OnScent’s Senior Vice President of Business Development with over twenty years of industry experience, sits down with Chief Marketing Officer Chris Fuentes to discuss brand development. They explore their strategy for “scentifying” brands, highlighting the team’s deep expertise and collaborative approach. OnScent’s extensive fragrance database, combined with Premier Naturals cosmetics, sets them apart in the market. Chris emphasizes the importance of innovative, data-driven strategies to explore new opportunities. They also introduce the Brand Booster Program, which offers coaching and guidance to help emerging brands scale successfully.

Scentifying Brands

Chris Fuentes: Tell me about what OnScent can do to grow brands to become more “scentified”.

Elena Skountzos: You know what I saw immediately, it’s the type of experience on the OnScent team. Our evaluation team is as experienced as it gets. They’re savvy. They’ve launched famous brands and they’re in the know. Most of them still live in New York City, so they’re right in there.

We just had a presentation today for inspiration and I loved it. Everybody talked. And that was a great example of collaboration. For a small fragrance house OnScent is very dynamic.

We’ve also got a huge database of fragrances–well over half a million. That’s why we can create so rapidly. A lot of those are remastered from fine fragrance inspirations and classic products. So, while fragrance is one side of it, Premier Naturals cosmetics is the other part that makes OnScent stand out.

Chris Fuentes: The other element to this is to think differently and come at it with a different perspective. Whether it’s looking at Tik Tok, Google data or at thousands of bottles, we collectively discuss what the solution could be. We’re excited because the work is paying off and we’re reaching into new categories.

Elena Skountzos: That OnScent Insights program–I’ve never seen before. As you know, my background is in marketing, and I’ve never seen that. At the push of a button, you just seem to know the answer. It’s about asking the right questions so we can go digging to find the right answer. That’s so dynamic.

Well, it’s interesting because I don’t come from the industry, as you know, so when you ask me a question, I don’t have any bias. When I answer the question, I don’t really know if I’m right or wrong, except that I did the research.

Yeah.

99% of the time people go, well, that’s what I thought. I just didn’t know for sure.

Yeah, it’s confirming what the industry already knows. But the AHA’s and the new information we’ve been finding is what moves us forward.

Expert Collaboration

We just had a great meeting with one of our clients and it was our first client meeting working together. Can you tell us about what their point of view was?

The client loved how collaborative we were. He saw the evaluation team, the CMO, and the sales team all working together. He got the sense that everybody had worked together, and it wasn’t just a typical marketing presentation. It truly was the OnScent team coming together to really think about his brand.

OnScent Brand Booster Program

We’ve talked a lot about building our Brand Booster Program for brands who are on the up and up. Can you talk a little bit about that?

Well, I love this idea for OnScent because with your marketing background, having been the CMO of some big brands and starting your own successful brand, you can act as a brand coach. That’s the ultimate for our clients and we’ve got a lot of clients that are building brands. They’ve got great ideas! These brands are going to go to the next level and just need guidance. Plus, our fragrance knowledge, ingredient expertise, and regulatory guidance help develop brands to scale.

We know that a great scent makes a great product. Great marketing doesn’t make a great product.

Right.

The beginning of growth is finding the right scent. We know brands will be successful if they find it. And that’s exciting part for me.

To ask Elena or Chris a question or to schedule a meeting email info@onscent.com or call +1 (201) 767-8700.