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Some French fashion chiefs are indignant. Robert Ricci complains that the assertive American-type perfumes should "only appeal to jet-setters who want to shock." Lanvin's marketing director, Jean-Louis Delpuech, scoffs that U.S. perfume makers have tended "to go 'down market' to a type of woman who demands more smell for her money." But others are more philosophical about the demand for perfumes with staying power. Robert Young, president of Yves Saint Laurent perfumes, traces the taste for strong fragrances to the same craving for identity that makes people want designer names on their clothes. Says he: "The French were wrong when they failed to respond to this need." Whatever the reason, powerful scents are selling. Worldwide sales of Opium are expected to reach $80 million this year, a lot for a brand that has been out for only two years. The top-selling perfume of all, with an estimated $150 million in annual sales, remains Revlon's six-year-old Charlie.
What seems to concern the French as much as the spread of the American scent is the expansion of American ownership of perfume houses. Coty, for instance, is owned by the Pfizer pharmaceutical firm, Pierre Balmain by Revlon, and Jean d'Albret by Max Factor. Globally, sales of U.S.-owned perfume firms exceeded $1 billion last year, compared with $737 million for the French. Girding themselves against further U.S. competition, many older French perfume houses have sought mergers with larger European corporations, and a long moribund national perfume-promoting organization called Prestige has been revived. Says Bernard Lanvin, head of the family-owned firm that bears his name: "Until recently we were content to compete among ourselves. Now we're closing ranks."